Open Road
by lucia marin
Summary: A road trip, Rory and Jess. A hard, fast, dreamscape story; love, pain, longing.......and hot summer nights on the open road. Complete with intricate conversation, and a good dose of imagery for the die hard Literati.
1. the departure

Ok, I know the road trip story is a cliché. But I honestly haven't found one I really enjoyed yet in the rory/jess domain, so I felt inspired to write one. I've only got four chapters and I don't know if I'll do more, but here they are since I need to get all these written things off my hard drive.

It's sort of a dreamscape story, written a little more artistically.

Rory and Jess ……well, some things are a little AU. After Rory came back from Washington, Jess was still angry with her. She dumped Dean and went out with Jess later anyway, and because of all the anger it didn't work out. Jess did manage to graduate; however, and right at the beginning of summer, luke and lorelai finally get their act together and luke proposes. As they leave for the honeymoon, this leaves jess and rory home alone for two weeks. They decide to take a road trip in hopes of learning to get along, since they might have to live in the same house. They are also looking at colleges, since rory wants to see what she missed.

Anyway, the story picks up at the beginning of the trip, but the real issues between jess and rory are explored gradually, with the real anger coming out in ch. 3 or so.

So, enjoy, and lemme know what you think.

Luce

It's evening when Jess and Rory load the car. 

She doesn't ask why. Most people leave in the morning, because it makes sense, because they are awake then and the world is new and waiting in the horizon. He says he's slept all day but she rather thinks it's because he likes driving at sunset, in the evening cool. It is June, june on the East Coast........small insects slapping the windshield in the indigo twilight, the thin, chilly air flowing over her arm as it hangs out the open window, dancing, curving over the airwaves. 

She throws her two duffel bags in the trunk, standing there in the pale gloom, framed by the brilliant dark blue sky, arms and legs at all angles tracing her sihlouette in black. Her hair has grown dark and long, messy, and the summer sun has brought the first freckles onto her face. He hauls one last duffel into the backseat which she recognizes as the books, stands back, rubs his hands and looks at her.

"Ready?"

"One minute."

She runs towards the porch where the still form of Lorelai is standing, holding a coffee cup, with big, watery eyes and thin lips. Her face is uncertain and yet resigned, worried. The girl hugs the older woman, whispering to her earnestly, reassuring, comforting. They hang on tight to each other, as though they know after this things will be different.

"So, write me a postcard from each college, ok? And none of that Tom Green road trip stuff," says the older woman. Rory nods.

She runs towards the car without looking back, slamming the heavy, rusty door. She looks at her mother through the window, very serious, very pale, hopeful, scared.

They wave as the gravel spits behind the car, raising up a cloud of dust which lingers after they're gone, and to the woman on the porch, it looks like a ghost.

They are floating down the highway in the darkening evening light, mauves and aquas and navy blue surrounding them like a painting full of living shadows. The forests line the highway, the old trees of this new, mysterious land that the world discovered and which became a flawed utopia. The car is racing down the winding gray line which takes them further and further, into the night.

Rory props her feet up on the dashboard, moving her toes to the beat which the air snatches and carries out the windows. Her hair stick to her lips and snakes around her throat, floating around her head as though she were underwater. Her strange blue eyes glisten darkly like the evening abover her pale freckles. The air around them is warm, but begins to chill after a while, and she wraps a ratty sweater around her shoulders and studies her long, knobby legs as they stretch out before her, toes pressed against the windshield. She pretends Jess is a random boy, looking at him sideways, letting her imagination wander.

The boy is her age, olive and Italian looking, with thick, dark hair and a mouth permanently twisted by too many scowls. He has cheekbones and a good body, and he knows this is his advantage; he is aware that he is capable of many things, and he's good with his hands. For these reasons he believes his future to be as secure as it will be uncertain and ever changing. Sometimes he looks at the girl beside him as though he cannot believe she is really there, cautiously, like a person who is used to having all that is good taken away. Out of fear and respect, he does not take his shirt off as he drives, for though he may believe himself to be immortal, he is not sure if she does.

They are grungy, careless, clean, for now anyway. She picks at the fringe of her cutoff shorts and nestles into the ratty sweater, flipping radio stations as it becomes deep night outside. At twelve a clock at night she is hungry.

"When did you eat last?"

"If you knew me well you would know this does not matter," she replies, offended at his parental inquiry.

"I don't think I do."

They both know this is true. It rests between them like a silent creature sitting in the backseat, waiting to bare its teeth.

"Satisfy my curiosity," he sighs.

"Four. Are we stopping?"

He pulls into a roadside exit. They drive slowly down a small street, and stop at a flickering neon sign that says Blue Pl te Spec al.

"Very local color."

"Synonymous with FDA sanctioned."

"Mmm."

He opens the door for her, and she is inwardly surprised but is too well-bred to show it.

It is an average greasy spoon, small, bad music, cracked red vinyl booths which scratch her bare legs. There is the shine of dull metal, worn countertops, and the smell of frying in the air along with cigarette smoke. She scrunches up her nose as he inhales deeply and this means something to her.

A thick woman with panty hose, socks and sneakers sporting a checkered apron comes over to their table. Her blonde hair has almost black roots, and her mouth is lined sharply in mauve, then frosted over. She looks as tired as the makeup creeping into her wrinkles. She snaps her gum loudly.

"What'll it be to drink?"

They look at each other.

"Coffee."

Snap, snap. Scribble.

"And eats?"

They quickly look at the menu, and stall a little.

"Burger and fries," she says calmly.

"Grilled cheese. And uh, Onion rings. You know what? Never mind, I'll take the tuna melt."

The girl cocks and eyebrow.

"Uh, hello, Three to Tango."

"Make that grilled cheese again," he quickly backtracks.

The waitress gives him a dirty look, scratching out and scribbling again. Snap, snap.

"That all?"

"Cherry pie," she adds, unfolding her utensils and scrupulously examining them for stains under the low hanging lamp.

A very irritated snap, snap, and another look.

They watch her heavy rear depart.

Rory blows on the knife, and then quickly rubbs it with a napkin, holding it up to the light again.

"I'll be surprised if we don't find human matter in our food. Maybe a big old hair. Maybe they save tapeworms for people like us," he comments, a small smile on his lips as she sighs and puts her silverware down.

"It's part of the adventure."

"Food poisoning?"

"The risk, oh doubter you. Where's your joie de vive? You're supposed to be the Clyde to my Bonnie, the Thelma to my Louise. This is like The Sure Thing, without us exactly hating each other."

"I can do without having a guy sexually assault me. But I bet I'd be good at that convenience store robbing thing."

"Yeah I bet," she snorts. "You can be the Anson to my Britney. But then I'd have to kill myself."

"So would I. But if we were to follow the movie, we should have sex first."

He notices her silence and pale blush, and decides to be more careful in the future.

"Sorry."

"What for?" Rory quickly retorts. Silence. She takes a quick breath and starts talking quickly to fill up the space.

"Are you vegetarian? You ordered grilled cheese, and I didn't know, so I didn't want to offend you, you know, be the bloody cow killer eating it right in front of you like a carnivorous, voracious beast...thing.."

He let her quick, embarrased change in subject slide, amused by her rambling.

"No. But Helga there wasn't looking too friendly, and cheese is safer. This kind of place I never order meat if the waitress is pissed at me."

"What worldly wisdom."

"That's me, the debonaire blue collar Joe GQ. Should I ask how their wine selection is here?"

"I think the choices are Bud, Beast, Miller, and some of that stuff Billy Bubba brewed in his backyard last week."

The food arrived, thin, grease-spotted paper lining the baskets, a chip in her plate. She looks at her burger dubiously.

"Where's your joie de vive?" he sneers.

Bravely, she picks it up with both hands and takes a big bite, smiling a wobbly smile as she chews fast. She swallows and smiles proudly.

"I think there's a fingernail in it," he says gravely, and points.

She turns deathly pale and stares at her burger in horrified fascination, but the blood rushes back to her cheeks as she hears him chuckle.

"Very funny, asshole."

Pushing her burger aside, she stuffs fries into her mouth.

"Whoa Emily Post. Remember to breathe," he grins, biting an onion ring.

She makes a face and him and keeps chewing. Her sweater has slipped off one shoulder, the lamplight casting small shadows into the hollows of her neck. His eyes are fixed on her, thoughtful. She bugs out her eyeballs at him sarcastically, and he realizes he's staring and quickly looks away.

"Have you never seen someone eat before?" she says, downright hostile.

"You eat like POW set loose in a buffet. Or like Anna Nicole Smith after a day of dieting."

"And you eat like Kirk."

"Now that was not nice," he frowns, inspecting his sandwich. "I have not opened the sandwich and written my name on the cheese with little pepper dots."

She pours on ketchup obstinately. 

They finish, picking at crumbs on the cherry pie, and Jess wonders how long they can go before their history will all come out into the open, filling the air with poison and setting them both aflame. He absently thinks about how he will explain himself, and if she will understand.

"You can have the last piece," she smiles, mellow, pushing the plate towards him.

Jess toys with it.

"I wonder if you'll still say that when the shit hits the fan."

She stiffens, but does not respond, and suddenly he knows she was thinking the same thing as him.

They stare at each other nervously.

"Check," interrupts a loud voice, and breaks the the spell. Grateful, they mutter, and take the paper from the waitress, who rolls her eyes and departs.

They are on the road again, driving, changing places, stopping at four in the morning.

"Take this exit," she commands sleepily.

They find themselves in a small residential town full of matching suburbs and fast food restaurants; taking care to write down the roads, they wander into a quiet little neighborhood and park under a big oak, turning off the lights.

"What are we doing?" she mumbles, opening her eyes.

"Saving money."

"Okay, not a good idea. I don't know if you ever heard that story about the guy with the hook and the girl and guy in the car and how he comes up and opens your door......this isn't Elm Street is it? Cause if you don't like nightmares-"  
"Get in the back."

She is too tired to complain further.

"I hope the hook guy kills you first so I can at least watch before I die and be satisfied," she says, and promptly falls asleep, breathing heavily.

He stretches out on the bench seat in the front, locking the doors, and that is how they are found in the morning when the little girl in the pink dress taps on the windshield.


	2. the first mile

They pull out of the neighborhood, tires screeching, leaving a very surprised little girl on her lawn staring.

Rory awkwardly crawls into the front seat, and he unashamedly checks out her legs as she does so. She is sleep warm, mellow, half-awake and shivering from the cool morning air. She tucks her legs under her like a little girl and drops back the front seat, ignoring the seatbelt. Her lips have a secret smile on them, small and hidden, as though she is having a dirty dream. He grins, thinking this to himself. 

They are driving fast in the early morning, blinding sunlight high above them, air warming fast; she wakes up and grabs a book, and insists on stopping in another town that has a Wal-Mart.

"What the hell for?" he growls.

"Because."

"Natalie Portman had a baby in one."

"Ok, now the valid reason. And I hope you know she didn't really have a baby. It was just a movie."

"Whatever. We can't eat out every meal; we'll run out of money quick. We stop, get a jar of peanut butter, some bread, baby wipes, microwaveable pizzas, a pack of diapers, you know," she says lightly.

"No, I really don't. First, thawed pizza is about as edible as the seat you are sitting on."

"Wrap it up in tinfoil and stick it under the hood while we drive."

"I'm assuming this works with burritos, baked potatoes, filet mignon, maybe a souffle......."

"Baby wipes for cleaning. I did bring toilet paper."

"Good, then we don't need the diapers now."

"Ugh, Jess, the diapers are for bathing. You soak one in water and then use it to wash your whole self off. None of that nasty sponge bacteria. You get a big pack cheap."

"The amazing Rory and her lists," he grins, forgetting his annoyance. "We could stick one on the radiator too if it starts leaking."

"Yeah! Or use one to clean the windshield!"

"Or strap one on you so we won't have to stop for restroom breaks until we hit Maryland!"

"You're pushing it, Jess," she scowls.

"You're the diaper enthusiast."

They stop in front of the Wal-Mart and park. The sun has grown glaring hot, reflecting off the gray cement. When they enter the dark lobby, he sees the strange grin on her face and groans before the words even come out of her mouth.

"Plus, I thought maybe you could get us a discount."

"GOD! Who told you?" he almost yells.

"Luke told Mom told me, of course. You live in Stars Hollow now, you have no right to privacy. So, wanna give me a tour? Or a sticker? Maybe wish me a nice day?"

"I can wish you a nice walk back to Connecticut."

"Ooh, touchy, Dirk Squarejaw. Apple pie?"

"Rory, get away from the baked goods."

"Fine."

They wander around, reveling in the cool air conditioning; they pile stuff onto the card, not thinking too logically. They are enjoying this too much, this random impulse spending. He buys a pack of undershirts, she gets a headband with bunny ears on it, they throw in a nerf football, a pair of cheap flip flops, a glittery sequined thong which she keeps throwing out and he keeps throwing back in. He momentarily strays to grab some Doritos, and when he returns to the frozen food aisle, he is momentarily struck still.

She is pressed against an open door, clouds of freezing steam floating out around her, turning her cheeks pink; strands of damp hair stick to her neck and shoulders. Her eyes are closed, breathing in the chilly air, her arm fogging up the glass, and she's rubbing a packet of frozen french fries on the back of her neck. 

"Rory."

She quickly looks up, caught, quickly throwing back the french fries, letting the door fall shut.

"What the hell were you doing?"

"Just.......chillin'...."

They both groan. She can't help giggling at her own corniness.

"I can't let you out of my sight for a minute and you're getting intimate with some french fries?"

"Ok, it's really hot out there. I was sweating in the car."

"Get a cooler," he commands, turning the cart around.

"What?"

"A cooler. We'll get a bag of ice and use it in the car. I drove like that across two states in July with broken air conditioning."

She looks at him, horrified.

"Are you saying it's broken."

"Well,......yes."

"God!"

"Are you allergic to hot air?"

"I'm allergic to you!" she snaps, and stomps down the aisle, peevishly throwing in a carton of Ben&Jerry's. 

He's a little surprised at her outburst, but not angry. He can understand. Things will be this way until they really talk about what has happened, and he knows it will not be easy. But they are both here right now.

They stand next to each other in line silently.

"Will it make you feel better if I let you watch me use my discount?"

"Yes."

The first fight is resolved, and as a peace offering, she throws some mint Lifesavers in the cart. He knows this is potentially very meaningful. You don't need mint Lifesavers if you're around someone you hate. You can just let them suffer from your dragon breath. But she put them in the cart; it means she is no longer irritated. This is how he establishes that self humiliation is a good method of keeping her happy, and then he knows he should have done this last fall, when all the bad things happened.

They drive across New York, stop at Columbia University, and Maryland, then Washington for a night to see Georgetown U. They are walking in the evening, because she wanted to buy something pretty, and he wanted to see the house where the Exorcist was filmed. Later, they sit on the edge of the Reflecting Pool under the purple night sky, shaded by the orange streetlights. They eat Indian food in take-out containers, danging their feet and talking about things that flow into each other smoothly like seconds flow into time.

"Nothing fabulous so far."

"Dunno why you're looking. You've already sold your soul to Yale," he mutters into his curry.

"Oh c'mon. Mom is leaving for her two weeks of honeymoon with Luke. We have nothing to do. Pretext is the vocab word for the day."

"Kind of a dastardly situation. What the hell were we supposed to do?"

"I dunno. Are we related now?" she asks, and he can sense a hint of worry in her voice.

"Not legally. I'm sort of a ........step....cousin?"

"That makes no sense."

"None. By the way, we should have bought some plug in Glade. We'll smell like Cafe Bombay for a few days."

She shrugs, watching the lights shimmering darkly in the reflecting pool. The shadows flicker on their faces in the warm night air, thick with city sound, streetlight, and the salty smell of the Potomac.

"It shouldn't matter if we never fall in love with each other," she says thoughtfully, sending a sort of queer stab through him.

"Yeah."

The wind ruffles her hair, drawing it in lines abover her eyes, painting it in brown and orange streaks glinting below her eyes. Small, white teeth peep from between her chapped lips; she is smiling.

"What are you smiling  for?" he asks, strangely sad.

"Nothing........it's just...a beautiful night and we're getting along and I ....just feel nice. This is nice."

It is then that Jess realizes it will be a long time before she forgives him, because it is her turn to torture him now, her turn to make him hurt as he had hurt her. 

She leans back, grinning, and he smiles sadly.

"Yeah, this is nice."

So they drive this way: all windows down, bag of ice between them on the floor. The wind flings their hair everywhere, they put ice down their shirts, they eat it, rub it over themselves while they drive to keep reasonably cool. They are damp, minimally clad, overheated. He has given up on the shirt; she does not seem to be offended, only jealous. They have a larger collection of bugs on their grill than the Smithsonian. The backseat floor is littered with junk food wrappers, soda cans, diapers they have filled with ice and used as neck-rests, and half a million empty coffee cups. The ash-tray is brimming, discarded dirty clothes have made a pile behind Jess's seat and the windshield is covered with Rory toe-prints. 

He points this out to her, and she shrugs.

"It's part of the roadtrip...magic."

"It's disgusting. Something's starting to smell," he says pointedly.

"Maybe it's you."

"Very mature, Bart. Maybe it's that half a peanut butter jelly sandwich you dropped between the seats two days ago."

"Maybe."

"I suggest it's time for a rest station stop."

"Ooh, can I buy one of those "Virginia is for Lovers" mugs?"

He ignores her hidden stab that goes deeper than she knows.

"You can buy whatever. When we run out of money, you'll be the one who has to dance on tables just to get enough gas to get to the next county."

"Only if you can sing me the entire Wyclef's Strippers Anthem," she scowls, scratching her neck.

"Sorry. But remember, it don't make her a ho, no."

"I am not dancing for money."

"Neither am I."

"So.......what are we gonna do? Sell our hair? Donate a kidney or some blood? Wash dishes for a few days?"

"Rest station stop."

They pull over, and he puts the trash in the garbage, the dirty clothes in a bag and empties out the ashes. He stocks up on some cigarettes while she eats a popsicle that turns her lips blue and washes the windshield. Her legs are getting brown, her shorts are getting rattier, her pink ballerina tank top sticks to her ribs while her arms vigorously scrub the windshield. She's cracking out of her mold, like a damp butterfly struggling to open her wings, hair fluttering in the humid breeze. She's a little more brash than the innocent Rory he'd found almost two years ago.....a little more conscious of her own power. 

Every twitch of her toes moves a muscle in her thigh that he finds starts a pulse in him; every yawn and stretch shows a sharp hip-bone in the low, loose waist of her shorts or an innocent strip of cotton. Every time she sleeps her mouth falls slightly open. Yet she never acknowledges it. Sometimes she makes him physically uncomfortable, but never seems to notice his tense, thin, drawn lips or clenched fingers. He struggles just not to touch the freckles on her shoulder while she sleeps; to stare straight ahead is supreme control.


	3. the south

Nights blur into days, and days blur into nights. North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Duke, Wake Forest and William and Mary are all explored. She buys some kind of paraphanelia from each one, and the sun deck in the back is littered with pennants and mugs. His left arm is now sunburnt, they've both gotten tanner and wirier, and her hair is thick, tangled and slightly less than clean. 

"It's time to stop somewhere."

"Oh c'mon Rory, it's part of the roadtrip magic."

"I've been shaving my legs on the hood of the car using the windshield water at gas stations. I'm sick of small bathrooms. You've been wearing that same shirt for three days and I've been wearing the same underwear for two."

"That was more than I needed to know."

"So will you?"

"Fine," he sighs, and they pull into an old motel, a faded sign above them flashing "Harbor Motorcourt". The neon buzzed, scattering little rusty sparks on his shoulders. The night was warm and damp, crickets chirping in the tall grass. They are on a South Carolina shore, tall reeds on one side of a gully, the ocean on the other side. Small islands spread into the blue water like mysterious inkspots floating into the sunset-stained water. Evening is falling, thick and black as sin, a southern summer night. 

The light in front of the office flickered; a few cars are scattered in the parking lot. She thinks it's beautiful; there is something old and secret about it, like a place where some terrible, beautiful thing has happened.

"One room, two beds," he orders, and the old lady behind the counter with the horn-rimmed glasses peers at him suspiciously. She moves slowly, eyeing them, muttering to herself.  They take the key, walking under the lacy, peeling white-painted iron work hazy with spiderwebs. A big moth flutters between them and dissapears into the dark.

Their door creaks and sticks; she almost expectsa skeleton to fall out when they open it. Looking inside, they grimace. The carpet is old and worn, the walls gaudily covered with cream silk embroidered wallpaper. A tacky lamp and two dubious beds are thrown in, along with a tv and mirror; the tub has a rust rim and the water drips ominously like small footsteps in the dark night. She shudders involuntarily.

"There's something about this place......" he notes thoughtfully, and she feels his discomfort as well. They check the bedsheets; thankfully, they are more or less clean. They each sprawl out on their bed, staring at the cracked ceiling.

"I know this sounds stupid, but don't you get this feeling like something's weird here? That William Faulkner thing."

"Yeah.....it's southern gothic," he replies, and they both fall silent for a while, lost in their own thoughts.

Each takes a shower, each avoids each other, and they both crawl in, but can't not sleep. She kicks her pajama pants off; the air is thick, hot and stifling, the crickets screaming outside their window. She feels as if a hand is pressing against her throat. 

On the other bed, he tosses and turns. He is scared, he realizes; this was the feeling he can't name. The night seems to seep in like a disease through the air vents. Reeds moved slowly like fingers outside. He trembles under the covers.

Her eyes are brimming pools, tipping, spilling; she feels the cool liquid trace it's way down her cheek. Her thighs stick together and her skin is sandpaper. She shivers. The blue light from the neon casts unearthly shadows.

She sees his dark form moving around. The clock reads midnight.

"Jess."

He jumps, startled, a tiny movement. She sees his eyes gleam in the dark.

"You scared me."

"Where are you going?" she whispers, throat dry, a plea. She clambers to her knees, covers falling around her.

"To the shore. Can't sleep."

"Don't leave me," she breathes, reaching an arm out into the dark quickly. It brushes against his shoulder like a wraith. He is still for a moment.

"Then come with me."

Mutely she obeys, throwing a big sweatshirt over the t-shirt and underwear she is wearing. She gets up, and he looks at her standing there in the blue light. She seems like a little child; long, awkward legs sticking out bare from the sweatshirt that skims her thighs, messy hair hanging in her face.

They walk to the edge of the surf, listening to it lap quietly against the shores. The waves roll in, rhythmic, faceless, like a mysterious voice in the night.

They sit on the sand. She watches him out of the corner of her eye, wondering what he is thinking about, wishing in some sort of strange way that she could touch him. She has clean hair tonight; sand is sticking to her legs, but she doesn't mind.

He is barely more than a dark shadow beside her. She reaches out her hand and places it on his face. 

Her thumb makes out his cheekbone. His nose. His crooked mouth, the strong chin, his ears, his hair. He says nothing, but stands very still, very cautious. 

Her hand pushes him back on the sand, flat.

She lays down beside him, scared, shivering.They lay there, shoulders touching.

Her hand raises up, landing on his leg; her elbows moves across his stomach as her hand raises to his hip, fingers pressing the bone that juts out there, before the hard muscles of the abdomen.

His hand slowly moves under hers, on the sand, until it hits her thigh. His fingers scrape across her skin.

The thick night air and the lapping of the waves surrounds them. Above them a devil moon suddenly emerges from behind a cloud, casting their faces in black and silver. They are both rigidly looking straight up at the sky, not daring to move their heads an inch, to look at each other.

They both draw their own hands back suddenly, scared by the fierce light illuminating their secret actions.

The surf laps.

His lips are dry. He hurts from being so close to her, he hurts from her touch, it has turned his whole body rigid. 

"Why."

Her lips curve upwards slightly in a desolate, bitter smile.

"This is how it felt last fall. The whole time I was near you. It hurts, doesn't it."

"So you want to punish me now?"

"I don't have to. You're punishing yourself," she whispers, eyes brimming moonlight.

"I'm sorry I hurt you," he hisses, fighting back waves of heated nausea.

"Because you want me now. It's too late. It was fall. I came back. I threw myself at you like an idiot. You kissed me, you touched me, you made me believe, and then you were gone before it was even Christmas; I should have known it was just retaliation."

"It was only the same thing you did."

"Then I believe it's my turn again," she smiles, cheerful as death. She flies to her feet.

"C'mon Jess! C'mon!" she screams, laughing, dancing on the sand. "Aren't you hot? Aren't you stifling? Let's go swim!"

Then she's flying over the sand, and she dissapears into the dark waves, as though they had swallowed her whole, erased her immediately. He's at the water's edge in a flash.

"Rory, stop this! This isn't funny!"

The dark shimmers quietly under the moonlight. Her head does not surface.

He runs in, slicing through the water, desperately diving under, but nothing can be seen; the night is dark and the water is India ink; salt water is in his eyes, his mouth, he yells for her and dives under again.

It is then he can that he feels her pass under his, and she touches his ankle, light as a poisonous jellyfish.

He surfaces desperately, and there she is, walking out of the water. She stands on the shore, her graceful sihlouette like a blue heron's in the moonlight. She steps across the sand like a ghost, disappearing into the sand dunes.

He wakes up, hearing the shower run. He watches her as though in a dream as she steps out of the shower in a towel, daintily making her way across the room. Modestly, she shuts herself in the bathroom to change and proceeds to towel-dry her hair. She smiles at him as though last night never happened.

"Hey Rip van Winkle. It's lunch; I brought you a donut and some Winstons. Sound good?"

"Uh, sure."

He is confused, cautious.

They hop into the car; she drinks coffee out of a 7-11 Big Gulp cup that she sticks into the dashboard compartment because it does not fit into any cupholder. She hums along softly with the radio-it's Clash, from London Calling.

"Hey remember a long time ago when you wrote down all the verses to Guns of Brixton?" she grins, pulling her hair back with a rubber band, shoving it into a worn out Yale baseball hat. The sleeves on her ratty shirt are rolled up, a shirt that shows a big bottle of clear liquor in front of a Confederate flag and says Absoloot Southern on the front; she's got another one that says Skank the Yanks or Yanks are Stank or something of that sort. She picked them up at some convenience store in South Carolina, somewhere near Charleston. The hem on her rolled up jeans is frayed all the way up to her calves, and she's wearing beat up Converse Chuck Taylor's. All she needs to look like a little boy is a baseball glove.

"Yeah, it was that night," he says softly, wincing. He looks at her.

"You look like Tom Brokaw cover art."

"And you look more like Marlon Brando than Marlon ever did. I'm buying you a cowboy hat."

"Then I would look like the Marlboro man," he grins weakly.

She digs around in the duffel.

"Ok, tough decision. A Good Man is Hard to Find, by Flannery O'Connor, or From Death to Morning by Thomas Wolfe?"

He winces again at the clear blows.

"You're really into this southern literature thing, aren't you."

"Yeah, I was even thinking we should go see Nachitoches where Kate Chopin wrote the Awakening. I hear it's beautiful."

"You and your women's lib."

"You say it like it's a bad thing," she says lightly, dangerously.

"I'm not. You're not the bra-burning Stein type. Don't get offended."

"I'm not offended," she says, her lips a thin line.

They drive in silence until they hit another town for the night, splurging a little on a cheap hotel. He sits on the balcony, smoking furiously, biting his lips and trying to read; below him, she floats quietly in the swimming pool like a corpse, occasionally doing a lap.

Neither of them sleep much that night.


	4. the exit

They'd reached Savannah, the beautiful city of trees dripping spanish moss that swayed in the soft breeze; the city of old houses and lacy ironwork, blooming camellias and mockingbirds. They stay in the Pink House for a night, reveling in the soft jazz. They drink iced tea and smile at each other softly, wishing they could forgive because everything is too beautiful to stay so ugly between them.

He smokes on the terrace at night, and she comes out between the fluttering mosquito nets and extinguishes his cigarette, her hair tangled, swaying, her smile as mysterious as the Mona Lisa's. 

He wakes up one fresh morning, knowing they'd stayed there too long; elbows resting on the balcony rail, he looks out through the lacy, thick branches where the moss softly sways above the cascades of delicate flowers.

She comes out, arms stretching, yawning, ruffled like a baby chick.

She sits in a lacy iron chair, watching him as he smokes.

It is his shoulders that always soften her. She loves the way the shirt hangs on him, over his strong shoulders that always seem so tense, and his powerful spine. It always sends a soft shiver down to her toes; it is easy to love his body, harder than it is to love him.

She curls her legs up underneath her, watching him, smiling slightly to herself.

"Morning."

"Morning," she replies, soft, mellow, almost singing it. Her blood is warm and rusty in her veins, mouth thick and slow, legs loose and fingers languid. He looks at her, eyebrow raised, sensing all these things immediately. He knows her language when she wants to be touched. But, he does not dare.

Her toes curle and uncurl, and she smiles from behind the hair that dangles in her face. 

He is puzzled by the mysterious longing, like the scent of azaleas and honeysuckle, emanating from her.

"Sleep well?"

Rory nods, watching him intensely.

"You didn't though. You had bad dreams. You said, oh no, all of a sudden. I was going to get up and walk over to you, but you suddenly sat up quick and you had a knife in your hand. You were breathing hard. Do you remember?"

He does not reply.

"Sorry I woke you up."

"Wanna tell me about it?" she asks slowly, carefully.

"No."

She shrugs gently, and picks honeysuckle off the vine, rubbing them between her hands absently. She keeps picking at them, taking out the stem and letting the drop of nectar fall on her lips.

"Does that taste like anything?" he asks, for lack of something better to say.

She is now standing in the doorway of the balcony, mosquito net curtains fluttering around her softly.

"Sure. Come here, try one."

He walks towards her, unsure.

She deftly separates a stem.

"Quick, it's gonna drip," she orders, and he tips his head and she lets it fall on his lips. He licks it.

"Almost can taste it. Not too bad."

"Want more?"

He shrugs.

"Alright."

They are tangled in the curtains, her mouth pressed feverishly into his, as his hands control her, move her backwards. His mouth tastes like honeysuckle and smoke, tangy, sweet. He loves her arms and legs tangled around him, and he throws her down on the bed, as she giggles, sitting up. He takes his shirt off, and then they're both quite serious. Jess stands between her legs, and she kisses his stomach.

There is a tattoo of a phoenix on his upper back, near his shoulder. She traces it with her fingertips. They are tangled in the sheets, slow and soft and warm, lazy, urgent, as he lets her touch him as she pleases. She is shy and demanding.

His hands push her thighs apart, touch the cotton edge of the space between them.

She lets him, and she is too warm and struck still of green fire to protest, to push away the gentle hand making it. His hand muffles her mouth.

"Rory."

But it is over, and she quickly turns away, jumping into a cotton dress. He sits on her bed in his jeans, bare chested, wishing for an explanation of what has just happened, but she has none. She begins tossing things into a duffel bag, avoiding his eyes.

"Packing, huh."

"We've stayed here too long."

He nods thoughtfully, truly sorry that she is so right.

That morning they leave Savannah.

They drive furiously non-stop, through Alabama, then Missisippi. It is late at night, and they stop at a Waffle House.

"Very nice."

"The atmosphere?"

"Jess."

"Ok, so it's full of smoke, everyone's scary, the food is disgusting. Half the trucks parked out there have a gun rack."

"I should've worn my rebel flag shirt."

"If you really wanna fit it, I can knock a few of your teeth out or impregnate you," he grins, then wishes he hadn't just said that.

She grimaces.

"So, plan?"

"Well, we've managed to make it down this far in one week. Twenty something hours. I guess we sorta took it slow. You wanna go west?"

"Ooh, Route 66. I wanna see that Barbie museum."

He rolls his eyes.

"Whatever, fine."

"Oh, you like Barbies too?"

"Not even Elton John likes Barbies. Who am I, Liberace?"

"I wouldn't say that too loudly in here if I were you," she smiles.

They pick at their grits, waffles and eggs, eating around the grease pools and cigarette ashes.

"This place is depressing."

"Understatement. Waffle Houses are to the south what Russians are to literature; devastating misery served in good

 sized portions," he says, pouring salt over his eggs.

"Yeah, Gogol would have a field day in here. He thinks he knows dead souls; he should see that trucker over there with greasy hair down to his waist and a belly that barely fits in the booth eating his grits alone."

"Stop, you're making me cry."

"Another thing you shouldn't say too loud in here."

"You and your stereotypes. Aren't guys allowed to cry?" he says lightly, grinning mockingly.

"Only if you're a flaming homosexual watching that Dawson's Creek episode where Joey and Pacey break up."

"Hmm, someone has a secret fetish."

"Ok, everybody knows Pacey and Joey broke up."

They finish up and get back in the car, and he drives during the night because he can't sleep, and because he is thinking about what happened that morning, and about the silky skin on her legs, about her fast hands and slow tongue. About how she flew to her feet so fast, ashamed of that sound she'd made, about her nervous movements.

It's hard to concentrate on the road.

He has so much to think about.

The land is flatter, drying out after the swamps of Louisiana. They stop at a laundromat in a small Texas town, where a local girl with dyed blond pigtails and booty shorts wearing cowboy boots winks at him, leaning against a dryer.

Rory rolls her eyes and stuffs clothes in a washer; they've been reduced to undershirts and unraveling denim. Everything else is worn, sweaty, gritty.

He ignores the blond. Washers rattle under the neon lights, the smell of detergent surrounding them. A fan whirrs in the corner; he buys her a coke from the machine and they laugh at the blonde's dirty look. It is hot, and they sit on rattling dryers, making jokes about vibrations.

They've gotten along a little better these days, her lightening up, seeming to forgive him a little more each day. He is careful with his words, careful to show her he is willing to swallow his pride.

She reads outloud, the shaking of the dryer making her voice hilarious.

Her voice rolls easily over the words, as he stares up at the ceiling fans. She is reading about shells exploding like fireworks, dark nights, thick, sticky earth, shrapnel shrieking, buzzing like insects. All Quiet on the Western Front.

They walk into a grocery store next door and split a large nachos, dripping cheese onto her leg and laughing hilariously. The air is hot, dry and bright under the Texas sky.

The sky is huge, blue and cloudless, like a plastic bowl over them. Her hair smells like sagebrush and leather, like sky.

He is in love, although he would never admit it. No matter what she does to him from now on, he will take it humbly, forever captive to her fingertips.

Of course, he would never tell her that.

They drive on, to the next water tower, to the next roadhouse, to the next ranch.

The road stretches out long and flat before them, colored orange and dust and blue.

It's late at night, when the sky stretches out for miles and miles, clear and dark and magnificent. It's a bolt of black glass studded with rhinestones, just like the windows at the bar where they've stopped. A neon sign flickers and hums, the parking lot is filled with cars that reflect the pink buzz against the clear black sky.

"Ok, this is not safe."

"Stop worrying. I'm a guy with a knife and a high tolerance for alcohol. I won't let anything happen to you, as long as you don't insist on going to the bathroom alone."

She still makes a displeased face, scrunching her slightly burned nose. Her skin has become soft and golden rusted, like the miles of Texas terrain. His is brown and taut and tense over every muscle, sharply constrasting the white fabric of his undershirt that bunches up around his boxer line where the rough denim rides carelessly over his form.

The neon night makes her lightheaded; she feels sleazy and glamorous and he suddenly takes on less emotional significance.

"Let's go get Rory sloshed," she grins, jumping up.

"Whoa, right. Don't even try any funny stuff."

"Stuff it, mom. I'm letting it all hang out tonight; I suddenly have an urge to line dance."

"Please supress it."

"C'mon, I just bought cowboy boots and they look good with these ripped denim shorts! Very honky-tonk chic!"

He rolls his eyes.

"You just used the word chic. You're not good at this letting it all hang out stuff."

"Whatever. It's night. It's warm outside and we've been sweating and traveling with ice instead of AC all day; I might as well work up one last sweat before diapering off tonight," she grins, swaying a little. He stands there, watching her in that parking lot, swinging her arms around, hair in her face, neon sign buzzing above her. The picture is contagious.

"Fine. Don't talk to strangers."

"If you don't."

They look at each other and smirk. There is something burning in their veins that is set alive by this ugly, shakily lit parking lot. He could swear she has just given him a come hither look. She's not sure herself she hasn't.

They stride into the joint; it's full of cigarette smoke, loud music, and glasses clinking under dim lights and loud laughter; on the right there are couples dancing, moving, people stumbling, they yell of the bar-waitress. He grins crazily; he's right at home, but he can sense her apprehension. When he opens his mouth to say something, she turns to him with eyes glimmering full of bar-lights. 

"Come on!" she yells, exhilerated, and from that moment he only follows her wake.

She slashes a path through the crowd, attracting several appreciative looks that make him uncomfortable. It's a rough crowd; she's so young and careless and loose-hipped, with her long arms and swinging hair and crazy smile.

They down shots and resist advances; the alcohol sloshes over the bar counters while she downs Bacardi, one shot of Jack Daniels and Perrier between them all just to keep herself busy.

Her legs stride onto the dance floor, and an arm grabs her around the waist. A decent enough Texan with blue eyes and a skylit drawl is teaching her steps, and before he realizes she's swinging around and round the dance floor, her hair drifting through the cigarette smoke like a ghost.

He observes feet; he's very good at learning anything through careful observation. It's all basic. A little more complicated than the basic grind he's used to from basement club holes, rock clubs, and the always almost lethal hip-hop spots where dancing is almost an art of war.

He glides through the curtains of smoke, clutching a pure Smirnoff, mouth burning, eyes focused. It's not long before she's glued to him, and they're sliding, moving; she throws her hands up and the bottle of Silver spills all over her shirt, making it loose and slippery on her skin.

The only thing they hear is the music, and the loud pound of their own hearts, and her short breath. His hands are on her; she is strong, flexible and breakable. Her lips are silver glass, their skin is chilled, then burning against each other. Her fingertips are ice, clutching his arm, the bottle falls to the floor unnoticed. Everything is a play of lights, spiderwebs of smoke, his damp skin against hers. They dance, her hair slaps his face, his hands are relentless, taking her apart piece by piece. She is dizzy now.

"Air."

They stumble outside under the black neon velvet night.

Her mouth is on his now, and she's pressed against the rough brick, and it's scratching her back but she doesn't notice the pain. 

"You're drunk."

"And you."

His lips are fierce against hers, slivers like ice between hers. Her mouth tastes like grapefruit and Silver.

He shudders, feeling the heat build up, tearing into him.

"God."

"Am I hurting you?"

"Yes. I don't mind much. Stop toying with that unless you mean it."

"Is that a threat? Cause I--oh......aha."

The duel is tongue against tongue, unforgiving; he presses the tip of his between her teeth. The only sounds are of distant music, buzzing neon, and her small, muffled moans and gasps. She clings to him, feeling a weakness seize her legs. Her hands are fast, harsh, they grasp his back and press him against herself, as if to hold her against the wall.

"Car," he points.

"Car is good. Wall is fine. Top of Empire State Building, a public library, a laundromat, White House bathroom."

She grins weakly. His hands are strong and quick to silence her.

"All in that order? This trip will take longer,"he grimaces, opening her door.

"Car first."

"Not very romantic."

"This is Texas. This is as romantic as it gets."

"God, that I should hear Rory Gilmore say this."

"I have......stuff....."

"Stuff. Yes. Stuff is great, great to have.....prepared."

There is a small, drunk, awkwards silence.

The moment is gone, slipped. The feeling is still there. They stand a few feet apart, regretting the fact that they'd started talking. 

"God, it must have been the moment."

"Still want to ."

"Yes," she grins.

"But not now."

"Correct."

He sighs. He knows they're both drunk and he's glad she's stopped it. He couldn't have if he'd tried.

They drive out into the night, letting the chilly air cool them off, and he wills himself to calm. They are too restless to try to sleep, and too forgetful to remember not to drive although they've drunk.

But the road is long and empty under the huge sky, and they drive, bloodshot eyes until they hit the sunrise that slips over the flat, rusty land, painting their faces in pinks and golds.

All they remember of the night before is a dim, heated fog, and a buzz of neon.

At least, that's what they pretend to remember. 


	5. the west

They've reached California.

The warm sun beats down on them as they speed past orange groves. The pungent scent of citrus and sunshine mixed with smog comes in through the cool air vents, lingering subtly. The sky is an immense, perfect blue, so perfect that it almost seems fake.

That describes California well.

They speed down freeways and byways, loops and clovers, swimming in a sea of metal and cement as they head towards the coast. She likes stopping at the little convenience stores, taking stock of how the food changes across the nation.

She hops into the car, throwing down a plastic bag.

"What is it this time?"

She grins, holding up her prize.

"What else? A "phat" burrito and a Zip coke. This is the Zipmart. The turkey wraps were Wawa, the Jamaican beef patties and hot dogs were 7-11, and the Bengal coffee and Krispy Kreme were all Motomart. I can't even remember all the other ones."

"Rory, Rory……….Eating our way through the USA?" he quips, turning the wheel under his steady hands.

"Have a Twinkie."

"Gross."

"Health nut."

"Carbohydrate addict. I can't wait till you hit 30 and lose your metabolism and turn into one of those fat women on Ricki Lake. You'll have to buy Richard Simmons tapes and velour track suits from Lane Bryant and I'll be laughing my ass off."

"You're such a sweetheart," she says, with some sort of indelicate sarcastic snort. Her mouth is pinched up.

But in a few minutes and a few bites, she's happy again. She blames it on the insane sunshine and the fake blue perfection, palm fronds waving in the wind, white houses whipping past.

"Let's go to the beach," he says out of the blue, and she looks at him surprised, because he usually doesn't care where they go. She's always the one with maps and red markers and plans, always the one with a sense of direction and a determined itinerary. 

"Sure," she smiles dreamily, fading off into a reverie of Orange County clichés……..he watches her long lashes resting on her cheeks, her half smile, her toes tapping on the dashboard.

"We'll rent a beach shack," he goes on, fueling her sleepy imagination. She tastes saltwater and oranges under her tongue. "We'll wake up early and go to sleep late, we'll swim and walk through Venice Beach, we'll smoke some weed, surf a little……."

"Nix the weed," she whispers. "Keep the rest. Jess, let's go see UCLA. We'll have a grand time."

Yes, he thinks, a great time. You'll get those freckles on your nose and shoulders, you'll get sunburned pink lips, I will wake up everyday to your smile, your rapacious eating, the sound of you turning pages, skin against paper. I love you.

However, he does not say this out loud.

Maybe she is thinking it also.

Neither one of them speaks; they open the windows and let the sun warm their blood, making it speed through their veins with anticipation.

"Good God."

They are standing inside a partly lit room. Light is streaming in from the windows.. In the middle there is one acid orange velour couch; to the side there is one mattress, and on the other side, there is a tv, a closet, and a microwave. 

"Is that a praise the lord kind of good god, as in god is good, or is that a good god as in, wow look at that orange, am I tripping or is this what I really think it is?" asks Jess, raising one eyebrow with a slightly amused expression.

"It's a good god as in, wow, we get a microwave too?"

"So it's not the Sheraton. We'll survive."

"You better not kick, sleepwalk, snore, or unconsciously cuddle," she grins, inspecting the closet with a girly kind of curiosity.

His eyebrow goes up even further.

"You're letting me share the mattress?"

She stands there, shoulders at an awkward angle, pink cheeked.

"I didn't……I wasn't trying to imply…….."

"Relax. I'm just messing with you."

She glares without subtlety, muttering something less than complimentary.

"What did you bring in from the car?" he says, eyeing the bursting army duffel with a  bewildered look.

She blushes even more, fidgeting.

"Not much stuff. Just….some pajamas and such."

He sighs.

"Unbelievable. Let me see."

"No."

He snatches her pack, dumping it out. She crosses her arms defensively.

"Bunny slippers? A robe? Kant and Hegel? Rory, sometimes you leave no words to be said."

"Packing light is for girls," she mutters, remembering her mother's words from a long time ago. "Kant has a lot to say about what we're doing."

"Indirectly, Kant could apply to anything."

"You're misusing Kant."

"He won't mind."

They stand there, looking around, satisfied.

"Swim?"

She nods, pulling out a swimsuit with pink stripes, and then stands there solemnly, looking at him. He realizes the situation.

"Want me to turn around? Cause I can……"

But he is frozen, because she has already taken off her shirt, holding his gaze steadily, eyes pinning him down. He has forgotten to breathe, and is careful not to move, or say anything. Her face is serious and calm, expressionless, eyes burning and blue; she pulls off the rest of her clothes, standing graceful and lanky-limbed like a heron. Her warm brown skin is lightly freckled, an almost invisible layer of downy blond hair on her arms and stomach. He has to fight not to break eye contact.

She slips into the suit and disappears through the door, into the blinding sunlight, her form melting like a shadow, then gone.

He stands inside the cool darkness of the room, breathing again, silent.

They don't talk about it. They don't talk about anything at all. Instead, they swim until they are so tired they cannot speak, and then lay on the sand, letting the last rays of the sun warm their bodies. They are exhausted, sand dry and sticky eyelashed. Music is drifting over from the sidewalk above the beach, some loose and lazy ska and reggae……..they are mellow and relaxed, languid. Her hand drifts lazily through the air, letting sand pound through her fingers onto his chest, thin rivers of gold sliding down his stomach.

"I see the ghost of Kerouac, Moriarty racing…….punk rockers, senator's daughters, surfers, drug addicts, animal right's activists……….California is one long, warm dream," she whispers, her voice like the sound of the pouring sand.

"Poetic."

"Are you mocking?"

"At least you didn't go all delirious on me with your Ferlinghetti California dreams or start singing Tupac," he grins, earning a light sandy slap. There is a moment of silence, after which he hears her quietly humming.

"California, knows how to party…."

She breaks into a girlish kind of laughter that makes him smile, springing up, leaning over him, shaking her thick, sandy hair in his face, covering it, and he's suffocating in her hair, her neck, her smile, her gleaming eyes.

She gets up, slowly meandering towards the shack.

"I'm making dinner," she calls over her shoulder.

"Put a paper towel down under the mini pizza this time. And only three minutes or the sauce will jump and I'll have to clean it again."

She rolls her eyes, moving in long, languid strides.

He gets up to follow her before long.

It is night, and they are both soundly sleeping. She is cold, and curls up; in his sleep, he childishly pulls towards her, unafraid and relaxed. They clutch the blanket, windows open to the ocean breeze, while the waves rhythmically sing outside in the night, advancing and receding in the infinite darkness beyond the water.

She wakes up before him, and pulls away a little, stiffly. It is morning and the first rosy rays of the dawn are breaking through, illuminating the room in a pale gold light. She studies him, eyes soft. His hair is thick and dark, beginning to curl in on the edges; his thick eyelashes and indented lip make him look like a petulant child. All the harshness, the pain, the guarded sarcasm are gone from his features. 

She cannot explain her desire to kiss him, to place her lips between those slightly open ones and steal the breath that comes out. She is afraid and hesitant all of a sudden.

But she does is anyway.

When she pulls away, she sees his dark eyes watching her silently, the eyes of a little boy, big and dark brown, hooded by those butterfly lashes. He does not say anything as she lays down, her hair splayed on the pillow, still looking into his eyes. They lay there for a while like that, not saying anything. He suddenly raises his hand, taking her chin in it, placing his thumb in that little dent, then tracing her ear.

He retreats.

"We should talk," he says simply, and for the first time, they both want to.


	6. the road signs

Days are pouring through a sieve. There are a few mornings spent between the jagged black edges of rocks on the Pacific coast, cold salt water and the sweet, pungent smell of cedar wood mixing in her hair. She stands wrapped in a blanket, on the edge of the water in the morning, watching the sunrise while he makes coffee.

She lays in the scented groves, under the damp bark, letting tiny drops of rain drip on her mouth from the leaves. He covers her in ferns and refuses to touch her, afraid of what might occur now that they both know the gentle truth.

Her smile is sweet and benevolent these days.

During the day, they lie on the sand, watching the grey waves and picking driftwood.

" You can always tell who the Californians are"¨ she says, the corners of her mouth turned up, eyelids half closed.

"That so? How?"

She sits up on one elbow.

"They always run into the water, surfboards under one arm, hollering and whooping about the waves, look at the size of that mother! Half a second later, they´re running out, teeth chattering, blue toenails, cursing."

He laughs.

"If you don´t die of hypothermia there´s white sharks."

"Win win."

She drapes a strand of seaweed over his arm, pensive, and his smile slowly becomes solemn. His eyes memorize her, burn her into his memory as the grey wind whips her hair around her face. Her arms curl around her knees, and her mouth is very grave. They know everything is rather different now.

They´ve packed up and moved. The car moves through the sweltering August heat like a mirage, and they both feel the change in the air, the smell of an ending approaching. Through the long drive through Cather´s Nebraska, she even found herself absentmindedly thinking about school supplies and such, ticking off a list in her head that would doubtless show up on paper. He can sense this in her, he´s always been able to read her when she tries to hide something. Cornfields sweep past, mind numbing in their similarity, blazing under the hot sky; they stop once, because she wants to walk through one.

"I´ve never done it before," she says rather defensively. He´s still grinning. 

"You´re going to get lost. They´re going to find your corpse years later, probably not too far away from other corpses of tourist who lived on the east coast."

"Well, at least yours will be next to it."

"Dream on."

"Jess….." she pleads, voice sweet now.

"Didn´t you ever watch Children of the Corn?"

"They don´t exist now. Crop dusting killed them."

"No way in hell," he replies, crossing his arms.

Minutes later, he´s trudging through the rows.

"It´s like a maze or some kind of scary dream," he hears her voice, seeing flashes of brown hair and bare arms through the green stalks. An odd sensation pursues him that she is only a ghost, rustling through the humming field next to him.

"Rory?" he suddenly says, breathless.

He can hear words. Flashes here, there, silence. Laughter. The acid blue sky presses down on his shoulders, the sun burning. The silence seems to buzz, heavy, eerie, beautiful.

"Rory?"

His feet have picked up now, going faster down the row. He is in a forest, surrounded by pale green, row after row. Leaves slash at his arms, tracing fine, invisible lines. The earth crumbles soft under his feet, dark and hot. His mouth is dry, no words will come out. 

She appears in front of him in the blink of an eye, suddenly and surprisingly there, out of nowhere. She is calm and quiet. His heart is beating hard, in the sound of the humid silence.

"I thought I lost you for a bit there," he finally says, through dry lips.

She nods as though she understands, and grabs his hand, pulling him through the rows back towards the small glow of light where they had entered.

"So see, that´s why the Cubs suck," she says, very seriously, snapping her gum twice, swinging her legs, sitting on the hood.

"Because an old greek man put a curse on them?" he grins, shaking his head.

"Yep. Years later, we now have the Billy Goat Tavern, founded by this great man, where people can come devour overpriced heart-attack inducing burgers and talk about how much the Cubs suck."

"Ok, what else?"

"Hmmm…..oh, Jerry Springer!"

"But of course."

"And original Chicago hot dogs. Better than New York," she says maliciously, smiling.

"Now why would you say that? You know it´s just going to start a fight and make me yell at you."

"Hold on to that feeling until we get to Jerry Springer."

He finishes putting in gas, screwing the cap back on.

"Anything else?"

"Gino´s East. I want to eat the hamburger pizza and write my name all over the walls."

He smiles.

"Can I put + Jess next to it and draw a heart around it?" he says, half jokingly, but he´s afraid he might really mean it.

When she looks at him, he´s surprised by the shyness in her smile as she nods, and he feels as though he has seen through something he was not supposed to for a second, and it made his heart jump a rhythm, causing some dull sort of ache.

"Chicago it is," he says suddenly, to get past the moment. "But so help me God, if you insist on singing the whole soundtrack all the way there I´ll go to Minnesota to see the Butter Festival instead."

"C´mon babe, we´re going to paint the town, and all that jazz…….."

"I´m warning you."

She throws her arms up, flipping her hair and hopping down from the hood.

"Oh, she´s gonna shimmy till the gutters break, and all that jazz," she sings, spinning under the gas station lights, one dramatic hand over the proverbial heart.

And she does not stop until they are two miles into the highway.

They stay at an old hotel there where everything smells of clean detergent and the towels are rough and embroidered with someone else´s monogram;  the shower stops working after he takes one, leaving Rory with a sink and a few washcloths as her only option. He opens the windows, so the sound of the night wind rustling the trees can come in. There are no sounds from the cobblestone street outside, and the thin lace curtains slowly and sensuously swell and retreat in the breeze.

He helps her wash her hair, careful to keep the suds out of her eyes. She smells damp and fresh from her washdown, clad in clean cotton underwear and a slightly large cotton nightgown whose straps kept falling down her shoulders. Jess remembers thinking she looks rather like a small child, nightgown barely to the knees, cut like a childish smock, frustrating straps falling, wet hair plastered to her head. He leans over her, turning her head under the faucet, studying the slight ridge of the spine as she stands there, bent over. Gently, he towels her hair, making light jokes about drowning cats and bedtime prayers, feeling his heart pulsing, his whole body warm, alive, waiting.

Every once in a while, she comes close without noticing, her skin brushing almost unnoticeably against his, as they do a sort of delicate dance around each other. She is surprised at how those hands who can break things in two can be so delicate. Rory knows her body is humming too, singing, sending out warm waves, invisibly beckoning.

They lay down next to each other, the dark of the room illuminated only by one golden orange streetlight, barely casting shadows of the trembling leaves on their wall. Outside, a wind from Lake Michigan whispers secrets from the north.

They each know that should they even touch a second, the least significant touch, that it would be impossible to stop. So they lay there, keyed and nerves taut, bodies buzzing silently like the flickering streetlight, unable to sleep, thinking only about things that made it even more unbearable. The tiny space between them on the white sheets expands like an ocean, then shrinks to a millimetre, like a hallucination. He is close enough to feel the golden down on her arms raising, close enough to hear each shallow breath, too afraid to move.

He squeezes his eyes shut.

"I can´t sleep."

Her voice makes him jump, sending a shock through his nerves before his body quiets down again. He takes a deep breath, trying to calm down.

"Me either."

The sound of sheets rustling. Another hissing whisper, each word heavy.

"I´m cold."

"Should I shut the window?"

"Please?" she says, and he sees the dark outline of her arm as she props herself up on her elbow.

Then he sits up. She blinks her eyes, and he is right over her, his dark form inches away, and her whole body stops working and the ground drops away, the ceiling explodes in stars as the poor girl freezes. In an instant he is by the window, and as the blood rushes back into her veins, she realizes he has just simply vaulted over her to get to the other side. She can hear the queer sound of her breath, strangled, rattling in and out of her body almost silently.

She watches the muscles of his back tighten, the edge of skin that rises from the soft cotton at his waist as he reaches up to pull the window down. She concentrates on the strange warmth curling inside her, eyes tight shut.

She hears him crawl in on his side.

Her hand moves of its own accord into no man´s land, the few inches of white sheet. Years later, she would remember how it had moved without her consent, as though her body had refused to be denied any longer. It rests between them, powerless to do more.

He hears it move, watches it incredulously, centimetres away from his. Everything suddenly flees, leaving only a calm quiet in his head. Everything is slow, as though underwater. He hears his heart, feels the cotton on his skin, smells her hair. His fingers close around her wrist slowly, daintily, circling it. He feels the little round bird-bone, the blood rushing through her veins, her pulse. 

The crime.

She jumped as though electrocuted. Her body purrs, velvety.

Very slowly and painfully her hand moves to his chest, landing on his heart, feeling its wrecked pulse tearing through to her palm. Her lips curve shyly in the darkness.

"Are you scared?" he whispers, no need for explanations. Under his shut eyelids, new universes and northern lights bloom soft in the darkness.

"No," she replies, voice small and still. 

He hear her body rustling, and he instinctively turns towards her, eyes still shut.

"Open your eyes," she says softly, each word like a petal.

He does, and sees her dark, gleaming ones, wide and floating in her face, glittering.

Her hand has forgotten herself on his chest, seeming attached there by that current. It drops softly to the sheet and slides back to her side.

He studies her features.

"Why not?" she says, feeling the blood rushing to her cheeks. She cannot believe she is asking for this.

"I don´t want to hurt you," he answers, his voice strangled. She can see the rise and fall of his chest. The kitten inside her purrs harder, and she feels it move between her hipbones, little ripples of warmth spreading. "I´ve never done anything like this. You know, thinking about the other person…….." he continues. "It´s hard. I don´t want you to be sad later."

She trembles.

"Can I touch you?"

She freezes at his soft words. This is different, different then the mere physical attraction that has moved them to act before, clawing at each other, frenzied. This is terribly different and she can feel everything reverberate inside her like an echo.

She is too scared to hear the sound of her own voice. She nods.

And so he does. She watches his hands in wonder, how they move like instruments, with such exact precision. How his head falls forward, gentle, lips parted, how she arches and coils and curls in response, how stars bloom and explode silently under her closed eyelids, colors and circles, ragged breath. She hides her face in her palms, and bites down hard on her knuckles.

It´s over.

Rapidly, he turns away from her,

They lie sleepless all night, not saying a word.


	7. the east

They cut through the green mountains, where the ghosts of the Huron pique her interest and more souvenirs are bought, added to the rather ridiculous pile already littering the backseat. There are various plastic coffee mugs from different locales, a cardboard Washington monument, a confederate flag, a pair of cowboy boots, t-shirts with various slogans, a chunk of cedar wood, take out containers and take out menus, a few empty bottles of liquor, and now a dreamcatcher takes the honor spot on the top of the pile.

"See, it catches the bad ones and lets the good ones through the middle," she explains, turning the thing around, shaking the plastic beads.

"How old were you before you stopped believing in Santa Claus?" Jess says, shaking his head. Her eyes grow wide, and she puts her head down between her knees. Her voice wobbles.

"Santa Claus doesn´t exist?"

"Shut up."

She grins, tickling his neck with a feather from the dreamcatcher.

"I believe in everything, just in case, because what if something did exist and then it took revenge on me because I didn´t believe in it?"

"You wouldn´t make a good atheist."

"Either that or I¨ve read _The Life of Pi_ too many times," she says lightly.

"By the way, that´s mine, in case you´ve decided to sleep with it for the rest of your life, just know that I come with it."

A blush sweeps her cheeks.

"Ok, it was late at night and it made a nice pillow. Softbacks do that."

"Unless it´s a Russian. Those are always bricks."

"Or an Ayn Rand."

"Or an Oxford Unabridged."

"Yeah, but who reads a dictionary?"

A pause. 

"Rory, Rory."

"It has a lot of interesting things in it, ok?!"

"I bet that´s where you learned all your dirty words," he grins, knowing he´s egging her on.

"Ok, so now you belong to the Paris school of thought that claims little birds dress me in the morning? In case you never heard of the great Sidewalk Chalk contest debate that took place between Luke and Taylor when I was four……"

"Ouch. Scarred for life," he exaggerates, fiddling with the radio.

"Mock me if you will. I was never the same. My mother tried to make up different meanings for everything, like shit means fluffy bunnies right? I got sent home from school for that, messing up the otherwise perfect attendance record I´ve had since day one."

"I can´t believe Yale still took you," he says, in an exaggerated tone of disbelief.

"Ugh, there´s no talking to you today. I´ll talk to the dashboard instead."

"Animist. I think you´re taking the Life of Pi thing too far."

She turns up the radio, drowning his chuckle out, and starts singing along, while the air from the open window rushes in, lifting her hair like spinning helicopter propellers around her head, like a golden brown halo.

The road drops away behind them like a silky black ribbon, full of August heat mirages, shimmering disappearing lakes………..

They head north, where the forests get cooler as they drive winding roads through the end of the Appalachians. They pass through a leafy, sunlight dappled Vermont, make time through New Hampshire, head to rocky Massachusetts. She drags him through revolutionary war tours, buys a colonial bonnet and a fake copy of the Declaration of Independence, and buys coffee in gallon size proportions from 7-11 each day. 

"Mmmm……….."

"You´re in Boston. For history´s sake, you should give tea a go."

She shakes her head, mouth resolute.

"Are you kidding? No wonder they threw that crap in the harbour. I would´ve too."

"Didn´t that have to do more with political rebellion?" he grins, bemused.

"Well, if they were making me drink tea and pay for it, I would rebel too."

He watches her drink, the way her eyelids close halfway each time she takes a sip, the content little half smile.

They are sitting on the hood of the car, parked hear a harbour. A few boats list gently in the breeze, painted against the vivid blue of the sky. 

A dime for your thoughts, she thinks sometimes, looking at him. I'd pay extra just to know what's taking place behind your eyes.

She lays down on the hood, the morning sunlight gleaming on her damp, warm skin, her face glowing a pale bronze. He likes the translucent pink of her lips, the little shadow that falls between them, hiding something alluring. He lays down next to her, studying the little freckles on her cheeks.

He whispers things to her in the morning sunlight, things she's been thinking about. He flies through her, pulling with him everything she's always known, tangling it up like fine strings……….his words reach something in her, tap into her mind, turning her secrets out in the blinding sunlight.

She finds it scary and exhilerating, talking to this boy who knows so much, who can spark something inside her like a dizzy lightbulb, rasping, glimmering twice, then springing to full light, blazing in it's neon intensity. It's his words that touch her in the place she always tried to hide, that wake something up inside her that makes her want more. It's the way he can always teach her something, something no one else can give.

She thinks of a line by Janet Fitch-a girl who describes a man……..as having a voice "like a hand between my legs." Her legs coil up slowly to her chest.

She likes it when he talks like that to her, in that low, concentrated voice, words each burning with meaning begging to be refuted, identified, dissected. She likes that tone of voice. It makes her think of things she is ashamed of.

"I want to know what you're thinking about when you smile with your eyes closed like that," he breaks in suddenly, and she catches herself, embarrassed.

When she opens her eyes, they gleam unearthly colors in the morning sunlight. Her shy smile reveals everything to him.

"Tell me your secrets," she says simply, and he shakes his head, grinning.

"I'll tell you one."

He delicately raises his head, bending close to her ear.

"I want to do with you what spring does with cherry trees."

She lets her hair fall to hide her flushed face.

"Pablo Neruda," he hears her whisper, and a smile plays on his lips at her tone.

"Another one."

He cannot see her eyes or cheeks, but he sees her damp lips mouth a consent.

"I like my body when it is with your body. It is so quite new a thing. Muscles better and nerves more."

He sees the corners of her mouth turn up a little.

"e. e. cummings."

He nods.

"Stop playing the Dick to my Dottie," she whispers, and he smiles, feeling the sensuousness of the sound.

"McCarthy."

Then, "I didn't mean….."

She cuts him off.

"I liked it."

He can't help but feel a current at this quick, stifled admission, her face hidden in her hair, her cheeks flushed, her breathing erratic, her eyelashes cast downwards.

He lays back on the hood next to her, feeling something strange, almost akin to what someone else might mistake for love, stirring inside him. It's just this warm, gentle feeling he can't place, a desire to bring her the world and set it at her feet.

He's rather surprised and contemplative.

Her hand knots itself in his shirt. He encircles her wrist with his fingers, turning it with wonder, feeling the slender bones.

The morning sky shines bright and burning.

"Her limbs are as delicate as an eyelid, love has blinded him with tears," he whispers to her.

"Yeats."

He smiles sweetly and kisses her like a child, a nervous, damp flower touch of a kiss.

Her eyes are wide and blue.

"Come with me. Let's go somewhere quiet. I just want to be alone with you."

She pauses, and looks at him puzzled.

"I don't know that one. Who said it?"

He laughs.

"Me, just now."

She grins, then becomes solemn.

"Ok."

The road is racing past. Fast, grey, thin, furious……….the cement curves and stretches out behind them at a blinding speed. She feels the iron taste of fear, anticipation, and pleasure in her mouth.

Her hands clench. She watches him drive, out of the corner of her eye, the way his hands move fluidly, the way she can anticipate the shifts in speed by his face, his careful analysis and split second decision, the hard line of his jaw, his almost imperceptible smile. She knows what he's thinking about. It almost scares her. He doesn't seem to want to talk, almost as if he's too preoccupied fighting some thought. 

Her heart is beating hard and erratic, fluttering against her ribcage, it's wings tearing.

His is too, but his face never shows it.

At the hotel room, things go almost the way she pictured it.

He doesn't exactly know what to do with her. Hiding behind the pretence of carelessness, he examines her head to toe as she sits on the side of the bed, somewhat flushed, head bowed.

He's shirtless, smoking a cigarette. The hotel room is old, but clean, with soft white carpet worn in places, clean, lacy curtains, dark woodwork, and gold painted fixtures on the white tub. It was a quaint little place they saw off the highway.

In the semi-dark of the room, beams of sunlight creep in through the crack between the shut drapes. He turns on a lamp, bathing the room in a hazy, dark glow.

Carefully, he takes off her shirt, then lays it across the chair, and stares at it for a moment, as if it's alien. She remains with her arms in the air, obediently, like a child, before they slowly fall to her sides.

He stands there, face bathed in dark shadows, eyes huge and dark, the color of coffee, she thinks. Here and there, the light strikes. The curve of a cheekbone. The shadow between his lips. The cut of muscle and bone, in two lines on his abdomen that disappear downwards, making her throat dry. 

He fingers the little eyelet lace strap on her champagne colored satin bra. She jumps a little at the touch. Thoughtfully, he puts out his cigarette, and takes a deep breath.

"You have to help me," he tells her, and she nods, as though she is a pupil in class, paying careful attention. "Tell me things. Ok?"

His tone is almost gentle. She shivers. He's doing this for her; it must be hard, this new selflessness, this unusual generosity. She feels a little flattered.

Almost absently, he plays with her hair, standing above her, letting the strands fall through his fingers. She seizes his wrist, holding it hard; he is surprised at the strength of her touch, almost hurting him. It conveys to him a desire that emanates wordlessly from her, and suddenly he doesn't see her as so helpless, so little. His licks his dry lips.

He unbuttons the raggedy shorts falling low on her hips, sliding them down her legs. 

With a heartbreaking naiveté, her hands slowly rise to his belt, undoing the heavy buckle, pulling it through. The jeans are next, left crumpled on the floor. 

He lights another cigarette nervously, but with a quick movement that catches him by surprise, she takes it from his fingertips and curves her lips around it as if she were sipping from a candy striped straw. She swirls her fingers in the patterns of smoke that drift from her mouth with the wonder a little child, and smiles at him.

He understands this, her admission to meet him halfway.

His fingers touch her so carefully, then hungry, then restrained. She uses herself entirely, as well as she knows how, learning, exploring, watching him with an air of wonder, pleased at the small things she can do for him, pleased when he likes something in particular.

He softly walks her through it, losing his head at times, but fighting back, before surrendering to her gentle touch that needs no training to convey the emotion it holds. 

They tangle in the sheets, and her hand reaches languidly in the air, and turns off the light, letting him attack ferociously.


	8. the north

The pale gray light streams though the windows, lighting gently on her sleeping face. He has been up for half hour at least, just watching her. He still cannot believe what happened, what he's done, and he's afraid and so incredulous. 

He remembers how afterwards she had laid there on her side quietly, her eyes so huge and full, brimming, tipping, spilling. Her mouth trembled bravely. His breathing was ragged and deep, body liquefying, melting, relaxing.

She'd been scared to meet his eyes. In the blue darkness, her fingertips clenched into a small fist on the pillow and she'd pulled the sheets around her closely.

He was hesitant to speak.

"Are you ….are you ok?"

She had nodded, head bent, hair hiding her face. A tear slipped out, tracing a gleaming trail on her damp skin.

His fingers pushed her hair back. Her wide, tortured eye met his.

"Rory, are you sure?"

She nodded again, vehemently, and offered a tiny smile.

"It was just so much. I feel different now than I thought I might."

He felt a quick stab at these words.

"Different how?"

She realized the unspoken and quickly looked up.

"Not different, physically."  Still shy, she looked away, hiding her burning face. "That was nice," she whispered, and he knew what she had really meant and smiled to himself, relieved.

"I just feel a little scared now," she said, her voice a little strange and sad. "I can't organize my feelings I don't know what to…do….."

He understood..

"It's alright," he answered softly, somewhat overwhelmed himself at this thing he's done, this crime, this desecration.

She clasped his hand, and her eyes fluttered closed, and her breathing became even.

In the grey dawn, now, he is watching her sleep, the curve of her neck, the soft slope of her cheek. It is hard for him to rationalize this. He takes out a cigarette, and decides against it, falling back on the pillows.

She is watching him.

Hair messy and rumpled, eyes thick with sleep, she sits up against the headboard next to him, drawing her knees up to her chest and hugging them. Neither person says anything.

"Do you think we were wrong?"

He cannot read her expression, but considers her words carefully.

"Why?"

Her head droops forward even more.

"Because, Jess, you never even said you loved me."

He brings her coffee, and smokes his morning Benson&Hedges. They trade newspaper pages silently, methodically, like an old couple.

When they are done, they fold it back up and drop it to the floor. A pause follows.

"Jess, I……."

His gaze is intense and piercing.

"You what?" he asks sharply.

"I want to know if you still hate me."

He tilts his head, his smile somewhat bitter.

"After what just happened?" 

"Jess, sex is hate as much as it is love. It doesn't explain anything. When I came back from Washington and started this..thing…again, you still were angry at me, and you left me just to retaliate. How can I even be sure this isn't more of that?"

He shrugs, irritated. He wants to say the words but he is too proud, so proud.

"It hurt," she says simply, her head turned away, looking at the wall. "We didn't speak that whole spring. And here we are now, and this is what's come of it. Now you want me again."

He gets out of bed, his gaze pinning her to the wall.

"I loved you since you kissed me. Nothing ever changed. You made me hate you too, but that doesn't exist now. And I know you want to get even again. And you did, on that beach in Savannah, that night. You won again Rory, you always win."

He paused, and his hard eyes softened, tired.

"And that's fine with me. I don't want to play anymore. It's up to you now."

She bites her lips as he walks away, face in her hands. There once was something terrible burning inside her, something so heartwrenching everytime she saw him.

Now there is nothing there. She knows what she really wants to say now.

She creeps into the clouds of steam, pink limbed like the Venus, pearly and damp. Her arms gently embrace him, her water-wet mouth seeking his, and her kiss is an answer. She has forgiven.

He slowly covers her in foam, turning her into a pink and white cloud, as she giggles into his neck, her laughter muffled; they touch and kiss and bathe off the night before, and towel each other off softly. She lays him down, quite serious now, propping him against the headboard and experimenting shyly. His eyes widen and his mouth presses into a thin line as he groans, a sound separated from his body somehow, as she bends her head and makes love to him. He's helpless in her hands, weak as a child, trembling under fingertips, her lips. And she lets her pride go, and assures him for the last definitive time that she has forgiven.

They sunbathe on the white beaches, dip their feet into the frigid water and walk through the tall pines of the Maine forests until time runs out. 

She checks her calendar and her face stiffens. He is driving, but still sees it out of the corner of his eye.

"What is it?"

She turns to him, mouth set and determined.

"The next stop is Martha's Vineyard, a.k.a. Richard and Emily's place."

They stare straight ahead, dumbstruck.

"Jess,-"

"I won't say anything," he interrupts, voice calm and devoid of feeling.

"It's for the best," she answers in an identical tone. "We need to be careful."


	9. the freeway

The cool mist rolls over the bay, shrouding the green foliage and pale beaches; dark pines stand proudly, swallowing a thin dirt road that disappears into the darkness. Gray wavelets break upon shore, restless and restrained, in rhythmic cadence. Between breaks in the fog, they see the proud outlines of the old houses, the pride of New England, their haughty eaves and windows standing silently in the grey light. Lush hedges and long cobblestone walks are obscured; a damp flash of pink roses shows, then disappears again. A thin ray of sunlight struggles, pale and otherworldly, to break over a point in the bay. Shadows of a ship slip in the distance like old ghosts.

"Edgartown," he notes absently as they drive past the stately sign.

"A.k.a. New England's most elegant community, property of he Aryan Trustafarians."

His mouth struggles to the semblance of a smile, but she can tell he is thinking of something else.

They drive in silence past the Greek Revival style mansions, the New England colonials, and the mysterious gated drives that disappear into lush lawns. She pulls in front of a gate, saying a few words in the speaker, and the lacy iron pulls back slowly, granting them access. She parks in front of the house, alighting quickly and hauling out her bag. She changed at a gas station into a slightly wrinkled slip dress and sweater, sliding battered white sandals on her feet. Now she stands in front of the car, her hands moving nervously over her hair again and again and again, almost obsessively. He's not sure of his reaction watching her; he doesn't know if what he feels is anger or pity. She cares so much, she is so trapped.

She tucks her hair behind her ears again, patting it down at the roots, smoothing the slip dress as though trying to iron out the wrinkles with her damp hands. She examines her face quickly in the side mirror, wiping at imaginary dark circles under her eyes, pinching her cheeks and biting her lips, running her tongue over her teeth until he grabs her hands abruptly and she straightens up, face twisted in an expression akin to shame.

"Stand up straight. You're acting guilty. Am I really that embarrassing?" he smirks, something raw layered behind his words. 

Her eyes flash blankly, open wide, face pale.

"Jess, I-"

But he isn't listening. He's already walking up to the door, halfway up the little marble steps. She hurries after him, standing next to him as the maid opens the door. They both set their faces into pleasant, bland expressions.

They are seated in the plush parlor, waiting. The room seems to be closing in on them with its gold embossed wallpaper, velvet and satin settee covers, dark mahogany floors, and luxurious ferns and details. A little silver drink cart covered in crystal decanters and set with linen napkins and Wedgewood glasses sparkles invitingly.

Then Emiliy glides into the room, with her elegant smile and perfectly set hair, doling out little pleasantries, engaging them in small talk, pouring Dom Perignon into thin flutes and proposing a little toast for this celebration. Richard, tall and imposing, presents himself impeccably with a certain practiced joviality and makes himself a Ketel 1 martini, but both Rory and Jess are hearing nothing really but the quiet pounding of the blood in their veins, their mouths opening without them, saying non-consequential little things.

"Darling, it's so grand to see you. I've missed you so this whole summer. We've been dying of loneliness on Fridays while you were gone traipsing around the country on this college tour of yours. I think Richard was almost afraid you'd find something you liked better than Yale," coos Emily in a voice much too pleasant for her. Rory supposes they all felt Jess's presence keenly.

Richard chuckles.

"She'd never let down her old grandpa like that. Rory's a Yale girl, and always has been. I wouldn't be surprised if she found her match there, like another certain Gilmore."

Emily smiles a little cocky smile.

"Oh Richard you're hopeless. The girl is not even 19."

She turns to Jess, thinking for a moment. Then,

"Well, it's certainly nice to be related to you! I must admit when Lorelai told me she was marrying the diner man I didn't know we'd be getting such a handsome young ……grandson…or…nephew?"

"Neither. Just a distant relation through marriage, I guess," he says, forcing his mouth into a smile that passes.

"Well, son," replies Richard, "it's nice to have you anyway. One of my regrets is never having a boy of my own. Perhaps you'd like to go out sailing tomorrow, get to know each other a little better."

Jess is smiling, nodding, but to Rory everything seems terribly wrong, terribly awful. It's as though no one else notices this nightmare; with a jolt, she realizes they wouldn't. No one knows.

She gulps her champagne, and quietly refills her glass, going unnoticed.

Jess is saying something about Mencken, Richard is smiling, Emily is nodding. The world is ending. Her palms are damp.

The maid announces dinner.

She notices his slight sign of distress at the four forks, two spoons, two knifes, two glasses, two plates and the salad set before him. She motions with her eyes, signaling for him to follow her. Smoothly, they both slide their napkins into their laps and pick up the three prong fork, smiling at the same time as though they are dancers in a nightmarish dance, performing in perfect tandem. Emily notices this quick duality, and something behind her perfect smile is now a little disturbed, although her face doesn't show it. It doesn't need to. Rory can read it in her eyes.

They barely make eye contact during dinner, but Jess holds his own with several well-timed and well-placed references that delight Emily and a few intelligent remarks about business that win Richard over. Rory smiles and laughs gently, indicating slowly and casually the proper dinnerware, patting the corners of her lips with the napkin, sitting up straight, and taking tiny bites. They have another drink after dinner, and Emily shows them to their rooms, impeccable guest rooms with monogrammed towels and little local prints on the walls. Rory plants two light butterfly kisses on her cheeks and says goodnight, and their doors close at the exact same moment. The identical clicks echo blankly in Emily's head.

At two a.m. in the morning, she quietly opens his door. She closes it behind her, and then presses herself against it, standing there like a small, guilty child in her slip of a nightgown that makes her cross her thin arms self-consciously. He is awake, sitting up against the headboard, smoking.

She takes a step forward, arms dropping to her side. The thin little strap slides off her shoulder, making her collarbones stand out starkly.

Her hair is neat and long and dark, her eyes glimmering damply in the semi-darkness.

"I was alone and I was thinking about you. I could not sleep," she whispers. There is no response, only the thin curl of cigarette smoke in the pale slash of the driveway light streaming through the window. Her voice is so small now, small and dark and anguished. "I wanted to………….."

There is a sudden, brusque motion from the figure on the bed.

"I hated you tonight," comes the answer. Her eyes burn in the darkness.

"I know," she replies helplessly. 

A pause.

"Come here," he says roughly, suddenly. She moves towards him slowly, cautiously.

In a lightning flash movement, he's grabbed her arm and pulled her in the bed, pinning her against the headboard. Her eyes spark in fear. His mouth is rough and strong against hers. She presses her weak hands against him but they're useless.

"Jess," she whispers harshly, afraid. "They'll hear. Don't do this."

He pulls her down, and she falls against the pillow. His eyes are stones in the moonlight.

"I won't make a noise," he whispers back, something strange in his voice. "But you might," he adds wickedly.

She might have had the urge to grin if she wasn't so afraid. There is a queer, terrible mixture of fear and elation pounding in her chest. His hands on her are making her feel that recognizable warmth spreading through her, and she struggles against it but she can't stop it. He's being reckless, almost mean, teasing and torturing something strange that is growing somewhere down inside her, a dizzying feeling she'd gotten a taste of before but could never draw out. There is nothing here of the gentle boy that handled her so sweetly, so carefully, the night before. The boy that had tried to make it easier for her, the boy that paid such close attention to her pain, the boy that kissed her so gently and followed her contours with a damp towel afterward, as though he were bathing a baby, has disappeared. This is a new, strange Jess.

He is pressing her down into the white, lightly scented sheets, mouth buried in her neck, her slip nightgown pushed up under her arms; his hands are on her hips now, pulling down what's left, pushing her around and breaking her in two, and a strangled sound escapes her throat. His hand immediately covers her mouth, muffling everything that follows; he's relentless and too strong for her, but she's past caring, clinging to him. The thing that was clawing earlier is now steadily thumping; she feels a sharp thrum and assumes the end, as she has before, but he does not stop this time. And the feeling, miraculously, it keeps expanding, widening, pounding harder. He won't let her go, he won't stop, and she doesn't want him to. Then there is a strange silence in her body, and something is sweeping over, pulling her under, exploding, blooming, ever stretching. He clasps his hand over her mouth but he cannot entirely mask the cry. With a gasp, it's over, and he collapses on her, and they lay limp, shuddering, but he's not done taking his revenge.

He's kissing her again, then her stomach, and sliding down further and further and she's delirious and barely capable of letting out a half-whisper, half moan, a weak plea of resistance that has no effect on him. She's almost certain she can't take anymore but he's doing something else now that makes stars surface under her closed eyelids and she begs but he doesn't stop, and the feeling is back, clawing and clenching and leaving her limp again! and again! and again! and she bites a pillow and holds tight to the iron bedposts and lets out a wail that stops both of them cold.

They lay there, still, covered with the sheen of sweat and her tears, when they hear the creak of feet on the stairs. 

She gasps, sitting up, half frozen with fear.

He sits up too, and before he can open his mouth she is gone, slipping out like a shadow. He cannot even hear the sound of her door closing again. What seems like lifetimes later, he hears the creak of her door opening, and the murmur of voices. He tiptoes to the wall, pressing his ear against it.

Emily's suspicious voice filters through the wall.

"I swear I saw you out in the hallway and I heard this noise, it sounded like a …scream or something. Are you alright?"

He hears the bed covers rustling. Then,

"I had a terrible nightmare. I went to the bathroom to wash my face, I'm all covered in a cold sweat. I suppose I must have cried out."

He hears the sound of sobbing suddenly, then Emily's comforting murmur, and a thin little smile spreads on his lips, a weary, sad smile. He opens a window, grateful it wasn't his door she chose to open. After all, there is no mistaking the smell of sex.

It is morning. The four of them sit silently at the breakfast table, Richard reading the paper, Emily buttering her toast and studying Rory, Jess staring at his coffee.

"So, where will you two be heading next?"

There is a pause after this sentence.

"Home," I suppose, replies the girl, a faint rose rising into her cheeks. "My semester at Yale starts in two weeks. I…should…buy pencils….."

The older woman nods sharply.

"And what about you, Jess?"

His head jerks up, and he stares at her, seemingly dazed.

"New York. I'm working for half a year to pay for college, and I'll enroll in the spring depending on how matters stand. I have two scholarships on hold from the state."

Emily's tone is crisp and polite.

"How nice to see such an independent young person."

There is another silence after this.

Richard folds his paper and smiles, oblivious.

"Jess, how about that sail?"

The two women are left facing each other. Emily stands up straight, her bearing almost regal.

"Perhaps you'd like to join me in the study," she says, and her heels clack softly on the wooden floor, and all of a sudden Rory is Lorelai and there is something so strange and terrible and beautiful about this feeling, finally understanding, finally getting it. The past 18 years of her life, everything Lorelai has never been able to explain, it's all here now and in spite of the bitter taste of fear rising in her mouth, for the first time since she has kissed Jess there is a sudden calm in her, a steeliness she does not recognize.

She has no way of knowing it is inherited.

There is not much to say in the study. Emily stands by the window, her back facing Rory, her voice even and soulless. 

"The maid found an undergarment belonging to you in Jess's room this morning."

There is a long silence. The foggy ocean is visible from the window, shrouding the verdant lawns, turning the world into a strange dream.

"This situation is one that I will not allow. Not only is it disgusting, seeing as you are now related,-"

"We are not blood relatives," the girl's voice cuts in, clear and calm. "It's legal in any state, anywhere."

"Don't interrupt!" whispers the older woman, back still turned, in a strangled tone. "You're embarrassing us! Do you realize what people will say? Do you realize what you are doing to the Gilmore name? How will this be received in Yale!? What will happen when people find out?"

She takes a deep breath, steadying her voice.

"If you still want that money for Yale, you need to put an end to this immediately. These are the conditions. I'm sorry it has come to this."

She turns around, walking straight up to Rory, whose back is majestically straight and whose face is completely calm.

"Then it seems to me we part ways here, Emily," Rory replies, and watches the way her grandmother's face crumbles at this impersonal use of her name that she has never uttered before. "I'll call Yale and defer my acceptance for a year. Perhaps by then I will have saved enough and gotten some scholarships as well as a loan."

Neither woman speaks. Rory walks out, closing the door behind her quietly, and grabbing their bags. She puts them in the car, to the surprise of the two men who are walking out to the gate at that moment. She signals to Jess, and with a shrug at Richard, the boy jumps in the car and they tear through the open gate and keep going until they come to a grey, sandy beach on their left. Rory suddenly swerves into the parking lot, killing the engine.

Her head hangs down, face masked by her hair.

He stares ahead silently.

Her shoulders begin to shake. She raises furious, tear-stained eyes at him. Turning towards him, she deliberately raises her arm and slaps him hard across the face. He says nothing, but looks steadily at her.

Then she's crying, crying and beating her small fists against him, trying to hurt him but he grabs her close to him, trapping her arms. He can guess what has happened. And somewhere in the terrible guilt stabbing at him there's a wave of fear, but also relief. He's so afraid all of a sudden, so scared of this thing he has done, of how he's destroyed her dream, and for the first time since he has met her a single tear courses down his cheek, his eyes burning hotly. It's followed by another, as he struggles with her, stone faced, holding her down as she cries I hate you I hate you over and over again.

He's so afraid she might mean it.


	10. the bridge toll

Here's one more! This story is….well, I like the way it's turning so I might keep it up. Thanks to those who've been so sweet to me-I appreciate it infinitely. You know who you are. Read and enjoy, and should you feel compelled, drop me a line. After all, you're the reason I post what I've written anyway. Much love

luce

The road passes by slowly, as though in a dreamscape. The sky is gray, and he wishes they were back in the oven warmth of California when everything had been so vague and hopeful. A cool sea wind blows off the shores, through the open windows while a pale sun beats down heavily on them. 

They're heading down towards New York. She hasn't said anything since they left Martha's Vineyard, and so he's assumed a tight-lipped control of the situation. She seems so small all of a sudden and it's tearing at him, guilt curling up in his chest, clutching at various things, making them hurt.

She chose, he thinks, rationalizing this. It was her choice and she made it.

But this truth offers no comfort.

He makes telephone calls from small gas-stations along the way. She sits in the car dully, a shadow of her former self. She is no longer dancing in the parking lot in her cowboy boots and frayed shorts. She is no longer buying junk food, rating the taste tests, making Crossroads references to piss him off, calling him nicknames like the Lone Ranger.

She just sits there. 

One time he came back from a phonebooth to see her repeatedly striking the lighter, trying to produce a flame. A cigarette hung limply from her mouth, and she seemed queerly concentrated on it, as though it were the only thing in her line of vision. He had taken it from her mouth and pried her hands off the lighter. She had not resisted.

Her head lays against the headrest, turned on it's cheek away from him. 

She hasn't read anything on the way down.

When they reach New York, it's almost a relief. He hopes maybe here something will happen, a breakdown, a crackdown, that she'll finally let everything out instead of limiting talk to small, dull, inconsequential comments. Yes, no, thank you. Even in despair she is polite.

He doesn't know what to do. He's never cared to deal with anything like this before. When they enter the city, it's late afternoon. The tall buildings are gleaming in the muted sunlight, reflecting steel and glass; he weaves his way down the packed streets, steering skillfully around taxis, through intersections, and cutting through alleys. Now they're lower down in Manhattan, somewhere around Tribeca. She looks out the window, examining everything quietly, staring, drawn up tight inside herself.

He finds a place to park, and grabs their bags. Pulling her to her feet, he draws her into the airy Tribeca loft world, up series of stairs, on a creaky elevator, finally coming to a steel door. There, he punches in some numbers, and the door opens. Inside is a large open room, empty, save for a mattress and a mini-fridge, along with a table and a few other small articles scattered around. The floor is parquet, and there are newspapers, phone lists, maps, and other strange papers plastered all over the wall. There is a thick book by the telephone filled with addresses, notes, observations, and a small pile of textbooks. 

He pushes Rory towards the mattress. She takes off her flipflops, lines them up neatly, and lays down on top of the blankets. He throws one of her blankets from the car over her, and turns out the lights.

Exiting, he locks her in.

Standing outside on the sidewalk, he fights the feeling tightening in his throat, making his eyes sting. He begins to run, determined, until he reaches the corner.

The quarter clinks, and the tone buzzes.

Two rings. Then,

"Hey."

"Ricky. It's Jess. I'm up at your place."

"Sup, man. Hold a sec."

There is some shuffling on the other end, a female voice, and Ricky's lower tones. Jess smiles grimly. Nothing has changed.

"Had to get outside," says the voice on the other end. "Get the lock no problem?"

"Yeah, sure," he replies. Then he clears his throat. "Listen man, I need some money."

Ricky's chuckle is static on the line.

"Some chick. First you want the loft. Now you need some money. Who you got with you this time, player? Paris Hilton?"

"Nah. Just some chick, not important. I'll be up there for a week, and I'll need one thou."

A static crackle.

"You know what that mean, man. I need a runner for Central."

"Are you shitting me? That place is wired! Half of NYPD got lookouts over there!"

"See, that's why I need a runner. I have a hard time finding people."

"Ricky c'mon man. I can't afford to have nothing happen to me. I got this girl on my hands."

"If something happens to you, I'll take care of her," laughs Ricky slowly.

"The fuck you will," he spits out. 

A pause. Then,

"Alright, bro, no problem. Can you do SoHo? I've got a few nice ladies there that might enjoy looking at you."

Jess stiffens.

"Fine."

"Fine. 11 ok?"

"Sure."

There is another pause, then Ricky makes a call, and gives Jess an address.

It's darkening outside. He's walking rapidly down a street, up some stairs, and then he's inside a nice little apartment where someone is giving him a suit, the cash, and a small collection of little blue Ziplocs.

"This is respectable trade, man. Try to act like you got some manners. Try to look like you came from Martha's Vineyard."

Jess stifles a laugh.

It takes him two hours. It's now eight o'clock. One more.

He buzzes an apartment on the Upper West Side, near the park.

A gentle voice answers.

"Southhampton 23'd," answers Jess.

Then he's being invited into a plush room, pre-war molding and antiques and expensive ferns everywhere; a chandelier sends trembling patterns over the thick white carpet.

Mrs. Delancey-Stanton seats him on the jacquard upholstered couch. 

He lays out the contents of the briefcase.

"Valium, Benzedrine, Demerol, sleeping pills, Codeine Tylenols, your regular uppers and personality pills, and Phentermine. The total cost is 4000."

She smiles, a polite, modulated smile.

"Thank you, darling," she answers, handing him the neatly bound bills.

And then it's over.

He takes a taxi back to Ricky's, returns the cut, suit, and briefcase, and takes his share. He's not sure what to do next. He's thinking about her, has been all night, and the way that navy blue makes her eyes glow pale behind the dark iris. He fights tears again. He can't believe this is happening to him, he can't believe it's been so long and now he is thawing again, like ice, liquid burning under his eyelids. A harsh sob tears itself out of his throat.

He goes to Saks.

The lady that approaches looks at him carefully, almost gently.

"Can I help you?"

He nods, and takes a deep, ragged breath.

"I need some clothes…for a girl….she's..about your size and height, skinnier, blue eyes, small waist, a little wider in the hips. I need something nice, something that a person at Yale would be wearing. Maybe a sweater, ….or…a."

She senses his distress, and puts her hand on his arm.

"Don't worry. I know just the thing."

She pulls out cashmere sweaters and clean cut white shirts, a brown a-line skirt, a navy blue long sleeve and a pale blue dress with navy trim. He buys her a pair of pearl earrings, because he's noticed she doesn't have any. The knot in his throat shows no signs of leaving. 

Out on the sidewalk, he draws his mouth into a tight line and fiercely clenches his eyes.

When he opens the loft door, she's up, cheeks flushed with sleep. There's only one light on, and she's standing by the huge windows, staring out at the street below her. He's brought Chinese, and he puts it down on the table and puts the bags down and approaches hesitantly. But she seems calmer somehow, as though in some way the crisis has passed. Her eyes glow darkly in the dim light.

"Where did you go?" she asks simply.

He shrugs. Something clenches in his chest again.

"I got you food," he says. "And some other things….It gets cold at night sometimes…"

She approaches the bags slowly and curiously, her eyes unwilling to let his go.

Slowly, she keels down on the floor. He sits on the bed, elbows on his knees, hands clasped tight together.

She takes each item out, laying it gently on the floor. She looks for tags, but there are non; she can tell by the names that they have cost a lot. Slowly, she runs her hand over the fabric and there is something very sad in her eyes.

"They're so beautiful," she whispers, looking up at his.

Hands trembling, he comes close to her. He takes the earrings out of the little box and gently jabs them through her earlobes, fixing the backings. His eyes are glistening, and she softly touches his damp eyelashes and says nothing.

Heads bent, they kneel there together in silence.

She slowly takes off her shirt and pants, and zips up the brown skirt and slides into the soft navy blue cashmere.

She does not speak but takes his face in her hands and softly presses her feverish lips to his trembling ones in a long, slow, measured kiss that erases the need for words. Tears are pouring down her flushed cheeks and she is shaking.

And for the first time since Massachusetts, the hand clenching his heart disappears.

They eat later in a companiable silence. He has taken her up on the roof, where they look out over Manhattan. The lights are glittering in the darkness, and beyond them they can see the vastness of the ocean, dark and restless, beckoning.

Her head rests on his shoulder, her eyelashes still sticky from crying. A wind blows her hair, and it flutters against the back of his neck. He puts his arm around her, and she nestles into him.

"What now?" he says gravely.

"I contacted Yale today while you were gone. They've agreed to let me defer until next year-they're saying it's almost common practice. Until then, I guess, I need to work to make enough to pay," she replies, her tone calm and even, but a bit tremulous.

His eyes stare out in the distance, shocked by a sudden though.

She sighs deeply.

"I don't know what I'll do to make enough. I guess maybe I can move back with my mom and work as a waitress. I hear they can make up to 20,000 a year and maybe for the rest I'll be able to take out a loan."

He fumbles with his next though, and makes a rapid decision.

"You won't have to."

She looks up at him in shock.

"This is my fault. I'll make it up to you. I have means."

She stiffens.

"Jess, I haven't asked you where you got the loft or the money but I don't want it if it's going to put you in danger." 

"Rory, stop."

"I don't care!" she replies, volume raising. "I won't do this to you! I won't let you!"

"You don't have a choice."

"I had a choice, and I made it. Now I'm with you, and I won't let you change my mind."

They sit there at a standstill, looking out over the glittering darkness.

"Rory, listen to me," he begins in a low tone. " I have a friend who's made good. What he does isn't strictly illegal, per-se. It makes good money, 1000 a day sometimes! This is New York, we sell to rich people not poor people and we don't get involved with other dealers! This isn't Spun, this isn't morbid Hollywood. This is clean, direct, and involves recipients who have a reputation to protect."

She is tight lipped and unresponsive. He continues.

"I can work and you can go to college somewhere cheaper, so that you won't be a year behind! Listen Rory, you cast your lot with me. And I refuse to let you pay for it. If it costs me in the end, it doesn't matter, I'll get small jail time, no big thing. You're the one that has it, you're the brilliant one who can't afford to give anything up and I'm going to do everything I can to make sure you don't. This is the end. No argument."

She lets out a small sob.

"And what if I refuse? What if I go back home?"

He shakes his head.

"Rory, you know you won't be able to get a load without your grandparents help. You can work two years as a waitress if you want and you still won't be able to get the 25 thousand plus that it takes just to pay for tuition! This is without living expenses for a year: clothes, food, movie tickets, books, transportation, and tickets to all the functions you'll need to attend! This is not high school, the costs will be overwhelming! What about gas for your car, check ups, etcetera?"

"Stop it!"

"I'm right and you know it! What'll happen if you don't get the money? If you have to give up Yale? If you move back home away from me, why did you come here with me in the first place? Why didn't you just stay at Martha's Vineyard?"

By now she's crying again, head buried in her hands.

He grabs her by the shoulders.

"Rory say yes, Rory, I'll take care of you just say yes."

Her answer is almost inaudible.

"What?" he asks softly, wanting to make sure.

"Yes, yes!" she cries, her hands muffling her voice.

She's giving in.

And they sit up on the roof, and he holds her until it gets too cold, and then they go inside and crawl under the covers.

"There's one condition," she whispers into his neck. "I'm coming on a run with you tomorrow. If I don't like what I see, it's all off."

He sighs.

It's morning. He's gone, and her heart sinks, wishing she knew where.

There is one more thing, she thinks to herself. A very important thing.

She crawls sleepily towards the telephone, grabbing the receiver. She dials the familiar number, and as it starts ringing, she becomes wide awake and alert.

A woman's voice answers.

Rory's lip trembles.

"Mom?"


	11. the pause

The sun is rising over the vast city slowly, slithering between the buildings, turning their icy surfaces into burnished gold and pale blue. A cold ocean wind blows through the open windows of the empty loft.

She had been crying, sobbing, hysteric.

"Mom something terrible happened you have to help me you have to tell me what to do!"

"Baby, mommy's here. Oh God Rory please tell me what happened, please stop  scaring me, don't worry I love you ok just tell me,"

She rises slowly to her feet, straightening up, breathing deep. Her cheeks are glazed with tears, her mouth dry and pale, her eyes rimmed with shadows.

As the rays grow, creeping down below to the twisted, shadowed streets, creeping into the trembling leaves of Central Park, sliding down sidewalks in streaks and slashes of luminescent yellow. One breaks on her face as she stands by the open window, the wind blowing her hair back, arms trembling at her sides.

Her face slowly takes on another semblance. Something is withering and falling away like a translucent skin, a shadow that is suddenly gone. There is a new hardness, a resolution in her eyes that has replaced the dazed, pained confusion. 

"Yale."

Her lips form around the words and let them escape gently.

"Mommy I made a mistake Yale Yale is gone….."

"Darling, Yale isn't gone. It's right there I promise. Are you ok for tonight? Are you safe? Did Jess do something?"

"No, mom, no, no, Jess didn't. It was me. And it was them."

Nothing else matters really. It doesn't matter what is sacrificed along the way. She has dreamed, waited, prayed, begged, crawled on her knees, alienated people, sacrificed relationships and dances and parties, studies till she cried from exhaustion.

That it should be taken away from her now, when she is so close, is unfathomable. Her resolutions, her morals, her old views of life have crumbled around her just like her childish fantasies and her innocence.

Instead, there's something left there strangely akin to the hardness in her mother's eyes when she parks in front of the splendid house in Hartford every Friday evening. She had never understood, she had been too young, too naïve. Lorelai had downplayed it, made it humorous, but only now Rory understands the painful rift that will never be healed. She understands it, because for the first time, she is standing on the other side of it.

Yale. College.

"Baby, it's ok. Go to sleep. I'll be there tomorrow morning and you can tell me everything. Sleep a little, ok Rory? Ok honey? Oh my baby…"

They'd both been so scared, so shellshocked. Her mother's voice had been so calm, so soothing. After all, there was still a week till registration. Lorelai had probably thought in that gap, anything could be fixed.

But this, Rory knew, this was different. Because their usual rescuers were now the enemy.

Did anything else ever matter? She can't remember anything coming even close. A laugh trembles on her lips. She would sacrifice Jess in a heartbeat, sacrifice her grandparents, and sacrifice even her mother. But she cannot sacrifice herself, sell herself into this luxurious slavery awaiting her.

College.

Nothing matters now but that. This is real life, someone whispers to her. Life without the cushions and safety nets. Life without the mommy. Without the money.

College.

She laughs outloud, then catches herself, frightened.

Her smile fades into the same thin-lipped resolution she has seen on her mother's face so many times. Hard, but smart. The softness has not disappeared from her face, but it's backed by pure steel now.

She closes the window resolutely, shutting out the cold wind, standing in a warm beam of sunlight.

Today is the first day.

Resolutely, she washes her face with slow even strokes. She brushes her hair in the same way, carefully steps into the brown skirt and pale blue sweater and pushes her hair behind her ears repeatedly. With a slow hand, she lipsticks her mouth in one long stroke.

She has no purse with her, so she takes the 50 dollars Jess has given her and tucks them into her bra.

She is ready.

They meet in the Campbell Apartment in the Grand Central Terminal. Rory is there first. She checks her coat and secures a seat before she realizes what she had presumed to be a bar lounge is actually an exclusive landmark. She gazes covertly at the 1930's style opulent design, the muted atmosphere, the leather chairs, the prices of the drinks, trying to appear less amazed. She feels slightly uncomfortable. A clock behind her rings twelve; a lady in a Chanel suit glides by, all perfume and pearls, accompanied by two men in dark suits and New England accents. Her fingers slowly trace the edge of the buttery, dark leather.

She orders two drinks, a Long Island Iced Tea for her mother, and a virgin Shirley Temple for herself, the old usual. Her fingers tremble and twist and knot a cocktail napkin. The server is cool and polite, and for a moment Rory agonizes that she has done something wrong. She quickly remembers to put this small town mentality behind her.

Lorelai blows in immediately like the north wind, instantly filling the room, making the bartender smile, making the server smile, and instantly appearing beside Rory. There is the gleam of tears in her eyes.  She says nothing but holds Rory long and hard, rocking her back and forth, and they laugh and sob and Rory cries and Lorelai's lips draw thinner and thinner.

When Rory is done explaining the story, minus the incriminating details regarding Jess's occupation, Lorelai looks at her solemnly. With shaking hands, she pours half of her drink into Rory's empty glass and motions Rory towards it. With a quick, careful look around, Rory downs it, and smiles shakily at her mother. Her hands gradually unclench, and she leans against Lorelai.

" I don't know what to do," she says.

Neither of them is sure. They both try hard to push out of the haze of pain and confusion that surrounds them, to find a resolution, to lay down clear answers.

Lorelai pulls out a cocktail napkin and a pen and Rory remembers something suddenly. A quick, darkly lit memory swirls around her, watching her mother so many times when younger doing this at the kitchen table – sitting there with pen and paper, biting her lip and making lists of options, weighing them.

She suddenly knows where the list making is from.

At the end of the meeting, they have found no better alternative than Jess offered. Rory is unwilling to come back home. Lorelai is unwilling to leave her completely alone, so they compromise for the first time.

"We'll meet here every Sunday," writes down Lorelai. "I'll bring you an account of the money I'm saving for you. You'll give me the money Jess is making for you to put in it. Since you've already deferred Yale, I'm pretty sure you can't enlist anywhere else so you'd better work this year for the money because you will need it. You have to promise to come home one day a week, and Friday nights in Hartford are off, of course."

Rory nods obediently, tired, glad her mother can give her the details.

The clock ticks one, the gilt-rimmed hands landing luxuriously and squarely on the number. 

They stand, and embrace, and Rory watches Lorelai as she floats out through the revolving door, the afternoon sunshine blinding, her brown hair swirling in the wind. Time slows down, and there seems to be a pause as her mother so slowly turns her head and her lips form words that Rory knows by heart.

I love you, she had said.

Then everything speeds up again, and Lorelai is gone, a girl is checking out her coat for her and taking the tab, and Rory dashes for the door, knocking her glass over. It comes to a dead stop on the carpet, spilling red and brown liquid on the thick carpet.

She is back at the loft now. It's cold, no heat. She puts on her coat, locks the door and presses in the code, and heads into the city. The wind makes her eyes sting, and the tall buildings seem to close in on her. She hurries down the cracked sidewalks, weaving between people with a certain ease. A taxi carries her down to the center of commerce where she finds the job listings. Her feet hurt by now. She holds back tears of frustration, plopping down on a bench and gathering her coat around her. Her head aches and her nose feels like it might start to run. 

She scans the papers, circling things, flipping pages, crumpling up some. She's ready to close it when one last small advertisement catches her eye.

"Private nanny needed. 212-345-3226. Excellent credentials needed."

Intrigued by the anonymity and brevity of the advertisement, she quickly jots down the number and inserts a quarter in the phone.

The cool voice instructs her to come for an interview in one hour at 40 Park Avenue. For a moment she is stunned at the address, at her luck, and reminds herself she hasn't got it yet.

But at four on the dot she is admitted into the luxurious lobby of the discreet but opulent building inhabited by some of the world's richest people. The elevator man takes her up to the floor requested after making a private call, and leaves her in a muted but fabulous salon. She smoothes down her hair, nervously fiddles with her pearls earrings, sits up straight and grasps the hasty resume she has typed at an internet café and stuffed into a hard brown folder she bought at a paper shop.

The woman that comes in is just what Rory though she might be.

She is about 30, with a perfectly coiffed blond bubble hairdo. A sleek tailored DKNY suit fits her toned frame, and she strides in on high stiletto heels. Her professional makeup and luminescent skin seems natural, as though she were born with it. In a  clipped, Atlantic accent, she bids Rory sit and takes the folder from her.

She looks up and raises one eyebrow, amused.

"Darling, what on earth are you doing here? Accepted at Yale?"

Rory blushes slightly, and tells her first lie.

"I've decided to defer for a year because it's a family tradition that each of us should work a year in a regular job, in order to learn how to treat help and learn the worth of the dollar. I'm taking my year now due to sheer exhaustion. Chilton was very demanding, and I decided I needed a rest."

The woman doesn't blink an eyelid, seeming to think this perfectly acceptable, as Rory knew she would. The rich could always afford eccencitries. The woman looks over the phone numbers typed carefully in, and excuses herself for a second. Rory can hear her speaking on the phone with someone. There is a pause, then a short reply.

The woman comes back in, and offers Rory her hand.

Stunned and wide eyed, Rory takes it.

"Welcome. My name is Grey McMahon, but you can call me Mrs. McMahon. This isn't standard procedure, but the nannies I've interviewed so far have been so sub-par that I've had to actually place an advertisement. You've been the first thing along that I've liked, not to mention you're a Gilmore. My husband knows your grandfather."

Rory presses her lips together, suppressing a bitter smile.

Of course. 

"I've gone ahead and just taken you, because we really are in a desperate position. David and Margot need someone to take them to school and activities tomorrow and I simply can't do it. I'll just need you to fill out these papers, take this training booklet I used on the last nanny and read it, and report to me at 6 in the morning tomorrow. Your hours will be from 6 to 8 in the morning, getting the children ready and to school, and then from 4 to 8 in the evening. Possible, yes?"

"Of course," replies the somewhat dazed girl.

"Go on and rest up then, you'll need it."

"I have only one request," replies Rory quickly, and the woman raises that eyebrow again. "Please don't mention my working here to anyone. My grandparents don't approve of my father's methods of training his children."

"No problem. I hear your father is running a successful business in Boston."

"Yes…"

"Well then, tomorrow."

On the sidewalk outside, Rory lets out a deep breath. She feels like crying again. What if her deception is discovered? What if her grandparents find out? What if?

But there's no going back now. She goes directly to the address Grey has given her, and places the order for four McMahon 3-b uniforms, whatever those are. With a pang, she thinks of her grandmother's maids. Swallowing her pride, she wanders around, a little dizzy, until she finds a hot-dog stand and has her first real meal of the day. She picks up the uniforms two hours later and is surprised – They consist of black woolen skirts that are cut stylishly and swirl a little down to her knees, and a thin black sweater with a rounded neckline and three quarter sleeves. They are to be worn with black dress shoes with low heels, she reads, and a black scarf and black or tan coat. 

She sighs, and watches the wet, drizzling lights blur by from her dark taxi window. Golds and reds and greens all swim by, lost behind the raindrops and fog, and darkness closes in around her silently.

She makes her way up the empty stairs to the loft, and lays down on the mattress. There is no one else there. She leaves the lights off, tears steaming down her cheeks in the cool room, fingers knotted in the sheets. She buries her face in his pillow, missing him, trying to find his scent. Her knees slowly curl up to her chest. 

Outside it is raining.

She is crying for everything she has lost. Her freedom. Her innocence. Her safety. Her heart.  

After sobbing quietly for a bit, she dries her eyes and lays there, silently forcing herself to stop crying.

I'm going to be strong, she remembers. She whispers the words in the darkness over and over. I'm going to be tough like Jess, and I'm going to make it. I'm going to be ok. Next fall I will be at Yale and all this will be a bad dream that's passed.

She hears the door open, and sees the yellow patch of light that opens and closes on the floor. He's coming towards her, putting something down on the floor. She hears him take his jacket off.

He lays down beside her, kissing her tear-stained cheeks, saying nothing in the cold room. In silence, he undresses her. She feels something land on her bare skin with the lightness of a feather. His eyes gleam dark and wet in the shadows, but his face is still and pensive. 

She touches it. It is money.

He lays them over her bare skin, covering her with bills. He lets them float down in a pile on her stomach, over her legs, between her breasts, on her bare neck. There are more and more floating, and there are tears falling out of her eyes and she is smiling, laughing almost, a choky, sobbing laughter.

She pulls him down on her and kisses him long and slow and sad in the darkness of the cool room, and the money falls unnoticed between and around them as he makes love to her and gives her the only thing he has to offer.


	12. parking

They stood in the middle of the empty floor, looking a little awkwardly around them. "Not a bad location, considering. Upper Lower Eastside. Close to the rich people, but still absolutely trashy." "Hey, this isn't Friends. Loft apartments decorated by Pottery Barn don't come cheap at anytime you need them." "Good point." She fingers the ratted curtains. "Well, these are the first things going down. Matter of fact, everything's going down. Start ripping." "Whoa, whoa. Hold fast," he replies quickly, grabbing her wrist. "It might take some time before we can afford new stuff." She shrugs. "My mom's renting a truck and bringing some junk over- some of my old furniture, a few pieces she found at a rummage sale, an extra refrigerator Jackson donated from his kumquat hatcheries....." He raises one eyebrow, and shakes his head. He doesn't even bother to say I won't ask. "Besides," she continues, "I found this great little retail store that sells the cast-offs of the high and mighty. There was some pretty Ralph Lauren print material for curtains. They have a coffeestain on the bottom, not very noticeable." He shrugs, a little bored. "Whatever. It's ours, do as you like." She cocks her head, staring around speculatively. "Fine. You can wander around making a mental list of all the good places to have sex." His mouth hangs open for a second. "Don't say that." She smiles. "Why not?" "Because it's dirty." "So what, I'm Snow White? If you recall correctly, Mr. Mariano, you had a rather considerable part in that semi-transformation." He sighs, defeated. "If I had known moving to New York would have made you go all Gertrude Stein the Sexual Revolution on me......" "Empty threats," she grins, batting her eyelashes. "Let's christen our new apartment. Consecrate it," he says playfully, but his eyes beckon, inviting, hopeful, playful, distrusting, dark. "Dirty." "Yes, I know," he whispers, slinking over to her, coming close, but holding her at bay, ducking his lips, wiggling out of his grasp. "Evil." "Come here and I'll show you evil," he laughs, lifting her up, sitting her down on the kitchen counter, opening her legs the slightest fraction of an inch. Her face is quite serious now. "You would like to kiss me, wouldn't you." She nods a little shyly. "All talk and no action," he teases. He loves the way she can bullshit with the best of them, but everytime he comes close like that, she hangs her head a little, and smiles that little contrite, shy smile, that little paradox of a smile that begs but defends. She closes her eyes demurely, like the clean little girls she's always been, the snowy debutante. He always gets this feeling......of something illicit.......does something to him...... "Hey," he whispers roughly. She pushes back against him, opening her legs a little wider, letting him stand between them. His hands are on her thighs. "Yes." He licks his slightly dry lips. "Ok."  
  
Sometimes, things like that happen. Other times he is tired when he comes home, so tired. She hates the business part of him. It's cold, austere, rational. He counts bills and stacks them with a practiced ease that makes her uncertain. On those days, he does not touch her much, only absently. It's almost as though he doesn't see her. Some days he's particularly moody. She sits beside him on the worn couch, snuggled up on his chest, but he stares at the wall and forgets to stroke her hair. "Tell me the problem." Her question is forward, blunt. She knows there are questions a woman should not ask. How are you feeling? What's wrong? Can I help? Can you talk to me? Can we discuss this? Did I do something wrong? These are all questions she has stored away in her mental file of Do Not Utter. He considers her words for a second, and something about their business sounding tone and their driving, rational point makes them less intrusive. "Here's our problem. I'm selling small time shit that makes us small time money. I spend so much time....peddling this junk....I mean, it's not crap you can really get off the internet, for the most part. The horse tranquilizers, pain medication and contraband highs. I even do a little weed, which brings in more. I hate doing this for days on end when I'm watching guys selling a couple of ounces of coke and making ten times what I make in a day. If I just sold something pricey for just a little while, you wouldn't have to do this, you could go to Yale next semester." She sits up, straight as a rod, deathly pale. "You must be joking." His face hardens. He has anticipated this response. He reminds himself this is why he never tells her anything. "With two shipments I could have one year paid off." "No!" "Why not?!" She shudders, on the verge of tears. "Because if anything happens to you I'll die! You will have killed me! I won't let you take the chance. I'll find out what you're doing, I will, I'll talk to Ricky!" "Calm down," he hisses. "Damn straight I will. And then I'll leave. I won't take a goddamn single dollar. I'd rather turn tricks at a truck stop than let you do this." He blanches. "You won't," he says feverishly, grabbing her by the arms. "You wont' do anything like that. You have to promise you'll never try to help, just do your job and stay here with me. Promise!" She sobs. "So you're allowed to jeopardize everything for me and I'm not? Jess, you didn't do this! You are not at fault for what happened. It was my choice, and I made it, and you can't fix it! All you can do is let me stay here with you!" He lets her go, and stands up, stumbling around blindly. He groans. "Oh God. What have I done?" "Jess! Stop!" she cries, grabbing her hair, biting her lips. Sobbing, she stands up. Silently, he grabs her arms, holding her steady. Leading her back to the couch, he lays her down and lays down next to her. He buries his face in her chest like a small child. "Don't cry Rory," he begs. "Don't cry. Ok?" She nods, sniffling a little. They lay there, letting the anger and sadness evaporate. Ouside the streetlights click on, bathing the small, dark room in orange shadows. "We have to draw a line," she says in a hoarse whisper. "I'll find out and I'll leave. Do you understand? And I won't go home either." He nods, giving in. He's too tired.  
  
The small stacks keep piling up. She counts them sometimes when he's not home. A thousand today. Five hundred tomorrow. Two hundred the day after. Five hundred again. One hundred. It's unsteady at best. He only does it four days a week, that's all Ricky has for him. He knows anything outside those boundaries is unsafe. He thinks of her, how she puts her black shoes and black skirt on every morning over her slip, bringing home the three hundred dollars a week that they use to pay the monthly rent. Rory takes her showers at the Park Avenue apartment to save water, since the apartment is mostly empty during the daytime. She also pilfers stuff to eat, or just eats there during the day, period. They turn the light on only when necessary, rarely cook, and live on weird combinations of white rice and whatever. Sometimes he wonders, with a pang, if this is what she really wanted, really expected. She's always been so pampered. Sometime she wonders if he resents for making him do this. She goes into Bendel's in the afternoon sometimes, looking at all the pretty, sparkling things. She tries on makeup and takes home samples. Often, Margaret Anne, who throws things away as soon as wears them, gives Rory a little something. But there is something about it. She can feel it in the morning when she wakes up next to him. She can feel it when they make love. She can feel it when she walks down Park Avenue, feeling the wind whipping between the buildings, taking a spare moment to look at the furs in the window, sipping a good cup of coffee or taking half an hour to browse in a bookstore while she waits for Margaret Anne to get out of school. It's a feeling she can't identify, really. Something like freedom, although she isn't sure what that feels like. She feels it when they count the money at night. She feels it when she picks up the ringing phone and hears a silence on the other end, a silence she knows is Emily. 


	13. the elevator

Hey hey it's Luce……you've probably already read this…..but it might be new to some……

Hope you like it :-}

The marble, gold, and brocade of the apartment sparkle in all their creamy glory in the early morning light.

It's when she makes breakfast for Margot, lays out the girl's uniform, gives her the schedule for the day, and drives her to school in the Lincoln.

She grins, thinking of what Lorelai would say if she knew she was cooking.

Luckily, Margot doesn't really eat. She likes Rory because she can't make anything appetizing. After all, she is on the swimming team and has to maintain her weight. She is a fiercely independent child, derisive and scornful towards her mother, but respectful and mannered in public. She does her homework, participates in minor, girlish scandals, wears cowboy boots with her plaid skirt sometimes, and smokes Parliaments all by the ripe age of twelve. She calls Rory Nanny, and hates it.

"I'm too old to have a nanny, I'd just like to let you know," she had informed Rory the first day they had met. They both sat stiffly on the chintz couches in the living room after her mother had left. "My mother is simply paranoid because Ashcroft Hannon got into that huge scandal with that eighteen year old from St. David's. Ashcroft is thirteen, which I will be in December, and she can damn well do as she pleases."

Rory had tried to suppress a smile, letting the girl rant on in that queer, plaintive (yet snotty) tone of hers.

"I mean, now she wants me to be drive to school like those British children. Quel ridiculous! Everyone I know taxis or walks. It's the best part of the day. We all go Jackson Hole and get coffee and smoke, and now I can't, simply because you have to drive me. You do realize I will resent you. I'm just simply too old to have a nanny!"

Rory had smiled gently.

"And I'm simply too young to be one," she had whispered. "Why don't we see if I can work something out, maybe still drive you but drop you off at Jackson Hole instead of at school?"

Something had sparkled a little in the girl's eyes before they returned to their usual dullness. 

"Ok," she said, somewhat unsure. "I suppose."

She looked at Rory suspiciously.

"You're not doing this so you can pin me, like my last nanny, are you?"

Rory had recoiled in horror.

"Of course not!" 

The girl's wan, rather sharp face had actually melted a little. A small smile broke out.

"Maybe we shall get along, then," she had conceded. "I'll call you Lorelai, if you don't mind."

"Rory's ok."

But the girl had shook her head, uncomfortable with the informal, and Rory had not wanted to seem to personal or to cross the line between servant and master.

For the most part, they get along. Margot is rather careless with other people's feelings, but has fits of generosity when she gives Rory an old Kate Spade purse she is sick of, or gives her permission to take food home. 

This morning, Margot's sharp face has dark circles under her eyes.

"You look like you haven't slept much," says Rory, broaching conversation gently.

She waves an impatient hand in the air, sipping her orange juice.

"Oh of course not. Me and Ashcroft and Selden and Julia went to Adriane Feynman's house, and her brother and two of his friends were there, and we all got a limo and went downtown and ate, and then went to a party. Of course, you mustn't tell Mum."

Rory hid her smile. Margot has these small, sophisticated airs that make her seem as though she an adult already. Rory thinks a little sadly about the fact that she might as well be, and feels sorry for her lost childhood.

"Oh yeah? Were any of them cute?"

The girl looks at her furtively, and feeling reassured, nods a little.

"Some were quite handsome."

Rory gives her an incredulous look, and the girl actually giggles.

"There was this one named Andrew and he was sooooooo cute!" The small girl comes alive, gesticulating, and Rory laughs, knowing it wouldn't take long for the outburst that followed. "He kissed me in the limo and said I had killer eyes and told me he thought I looked kinda like Heidi Klum! Selden was crazy jealous!"

"Nice work," grins Rory in response, ushering the girl towards the door, giving her her backpack. She tries not to wonder what Margot means by kiss.

Sometimes, in small moments like these, Rory doesn't mind what she is doing. One Friday night, when her parents leave for another charity event, Margot, who has an ugly cold watches a movie with Rory. The younger girl brings out some organic fat-free vegetable chips to snack on, and that's when Rory decides it's time to interfere.

"Margaret Anne, have you ever had Red Vines?"

They call the concierge, and half an hour later, Rory spreads out a collection of candy on the living room table. Margot is frankly shocked.

"Mum would kill you," is all she says, wide eyed.

They watch Heathers, and she thaws to the point where Rory can barely recognize her. She tells Rory about random, insignificant things, things she might regret the next morning. Shifting, she props her feet up on the coffeetable.

"So, Lorelai, do you have a boyfriend?"

Rory nods consent, chewing on a Milk Dud.

The child clings excitedly to this prospect.

"Is he hot?"

Rory nods again, with a sly smile they both delight in.

"Do you do it all the time?"

She stops mid-chew, choking a little.

"Do what?"

"You know, sex."

Rory closes her eyes.

"Margot….can I call you Maggie?"

The other girl considers this for a second.

"Like the Rod Stewart song?"

"Sure."

"Ok."

Rory takes another deep breath.

"Well, Maggie, I think that's a little personal, don't you?"

"Not really. I mean, Ashcroft does it, and she's only thirteen. My mum does it all the time and not always with the same person, if you get my drift. Everybody does it, so do you?"

Rory, disturbed, tries to think of an answer, but can't really. All she can think about is the child, and how she came to know this. She guesses twelve isn't what it used to be.

"Yeah, we do," is the only answer Rory can think of.

"I thought as much. Is it good?"

Another shocker. But there is no use pretending chastity with a twelve year old who probably knows more about sex than you do.

"I guess so," she answers, and weirdly, feels a blush coming on. This is too strange. But the girls smokes. She smokes. 

"Ok, Lorelai, there is not maybe. It is or it isn't. So? Does he pack extra mileage?"

"Maggie!"

She other girl scrunches up her nose.

"Sheesh, you'd think you were still a virgin."

Rory's tone is very odd.

"Do you mean…..you….aren't?"

Maggie looks at her scornfully.

"Of course I am. I'm waiting until fourteen at least. I mean, Ashcroft is a slut. She's not just thirteen, she like Thirteen the movie." She chews meditatively on a Red Vine. Her voice is almost shy. "Lorelai?"

"Yes," replies Rory, wondering what shocker would come out next.

"I kinda wish someone had explained these things to me better. No one's ever really discussed them. Mum says it's improper to discuss it with your child. She says that's what nannies are for."

Rory clutches her heart.

"What do you want to know?"

The girl settles down comfortably on the couch, popping a sour gummybear.

"I kinda wanna know why guys always try to grope you. Is it because they can't help themselves? Oh, and how come if you sleep with them they don't call you? And can you get a disease by kissing? Cause Selden said she heard about these little bumps or something. Oh, and I'm not really sure but there is this thing……I heard that guys sometimes kiss you….down there…."

"Those who grope and don't call are sleazeballs. Yes, you can get herpes, and yes, …sometimes they kiss you…in other places."

"Ok. And Heather Wellington said that she heard that you're not supposed to take birth control if you're really young because it makes you get huge boobs?"

"Lie. You're not supposed to take birth control young because you're not supposed to have sex young."

The small girl in the bathrobe looks at her quizzically.

"I bet you're a Republican," is all she says.

Jess laughs for an hour after she tells the story, while she pelts him with pillows. The early evening settles in closely around them, and they turn on one lamp, count the money, and store it away. She's learning to make things by now, so she cooks some mac and cheese from the box and he declares it fabulous. They feed each other on the living room floor among piles and piles of books. She reads to him from an old copy of Perrine's Literature, the college text, and he lays down with his head in her lap, nestled into a quilt.

There is a tranquility present that neither have felt for a long time. He feels as though he's almost painted into this scene, and something warm moves in his chest, gripping his heart. She looks like a picture of the Madonna, blue eyed and virgin lipped. The dark, terrifying, sensual things that happened on the road, the nights of thwarted longing seem a distant memory. The night when he was afraid that she didn't love him.

He's still afraid sometimes.

He has picked up the phone also, to hear a silence on the other end.

He knows who it is. He's just waiting for them to come back and get her.

What will happen after this? When she finally goes to Yale? Where will he fit into her world then? He knows he was mistaken to believe for so long that she could be his. He is aware it is only a matter of time before circumstances take her away from him. This is what Dean must have felt, was the thought that flashes into his head.

It shocks him. What Dean must have felt.

Surely he didn't think Rory would belong to him. Surely he knew, from the first moment he had met the grandparents, that it couldn't possibly work. If her dream comes true, he thinks, she'll never belong to anyone. Correspondent in a foreign country. The only person she will ever belong to is someone who is lucky enough to be in her way, someone who will match perfectly situation wise and will facilitate a relationship by providing the means to keep her pursuing her dream.

Jess wonders if she'll be lonely.

To go this far out of her way, to sacrifice that much, it does not seem possible for her. She was nobody's long before she belonged to any man.

He knows he'll never follow her, just hang around waiting for her. He knows he should have left her, let her go on the track she had planned, not thrown this unexpected interlude in her life.

But he couldn't help it.

He's almost sure he is in love with her, whatever that means. He's certain he must be, to do this insane thing that seems to be working out in such a strange way.

I'll always be below her though, and this is what will take me away, he thinks.

He knows there is only one solution.

Money. For him to possess her he needs money.

For her to stay free, she needs money.

He knows if he was successful, in some way, it would be his single chance.


	14. the diner

She spins slowly, as though she is in a slow motion dream. Her arms float up and down, her skirt twirling around her, her long hair tangled in her face.

He thinks about the word beautiful.

He doesn't know how to tell her what passes through his mind when he sees her like this. How vulnerable, how afraid he feels. These are the things that he will never tell anyone. 

Beams of afternoon sunlight flash behind her, through her hair, on her smile, her laughter echoing across the small apartment.

She's doing a loopy, ballerina half swing dance, swerving, laughing, keeping no time and measure. As he blinks, he feels the world slow down, and his eyelids feel heavy. They open again, just to see her move so gently. The sound is off, like in a movie.

He wishes he could cry.

He counts the money every night, hungry, afraid. He lies about eating, he reads old papers, he asks for more work. In moments like these, where she floats before him like a drowsy angel, it's all he can think about. Only with her he is gentle, warm, smiling. He has to be cold, hard, businesslike, wary, and careful the rest of the time.

Dust particles float like diamond powder in the gold light, slowly drifting down to the ground, in clouds, wavering. 

The sound is still off, and all he can hear is a sort of distant buzzing in the silence. Her eyes are so huge, her smile so brilliant, and she tilts her creamy white neck back, laughing with her whole mouth, her eyes, her hands, but all he can see are her hands outstretched towards him. Her smile becomes puzzled, and he wants to wake up, to make things speed up to normal again, but it's not working. Now the corners of her mouth are falling down and her lips are opening. She's hurtling, floating towards him so rapidly but slowly, like an asteroid, growing larger, closer. When he blinks flashes of light shoot off behind his eyelids. He feels himself oddly suspended, pulled backwards by something, and then the world goes black.

When he wakes up, all he can hear is her voice. He is in the shadows now, and she is crying and begging, her icy cold hands dripping with water holding his face, then shaking his shoulders.

She's sobbing, telling him to wake up.

"I'm awake," he whispers hoarsely, and she just draws backwards hard, plunking down, and she puts her head down in her hands and cries. He tries to sit up, dizzy. "It's ok. I'm alright. Rory don't cry, see, I'm good now, I'm fine. Look at me, look, see?"

"What's wrong with you?" she's asking, wiping at her eyes, her face, angry, sobbing pitifully like a small child. "Huh? You gonna tell me?"

His forehead is cold from her hands. He takes a dry swallow.

"I think……I just need to eat something."

They sit side by side. The afternoon is darkening. Neither says much. He finishes drinking from the orange juice carton. It's empty.

"We need to talk," she says, her tone flat.

"Look, I just forgot about lunch," he tells her, a hint of anger seeping through his gentle words.

"So you pass out? Jess, what about all the times you said we didn't need groceries, just because I told you I already ate at my job? This is insane! What's 20 dollars??!!"

He turns towards her, his eyes dull.

"It's a run for me. It's two hours of work for you." He rubs his jaw roughly, and turns away. "It was just today. I'm fine all the damn time, I just didn't have time today."

She trembles a little.

"Jess, at the rate you're going now, we're going to have more than 30 thousand by next fall. That's enough! Don't you understand this?"

He stands up. He is tired. He knows she will not understand this, she will never know that the only he can keep her is to make enough, make more than enough.

"It isn't enough."  
She stands up too, almost hysterical.

"What more can you want? What else?!"

He looks away, and tells her because he knows she won't allow lies.

"I want Emily and Richard Gilmore to let me have you," he says. "I want you to not be ashamed to introduce me. I want to come to Friday night dinner. I want to have some kind of money, respect attached to my name that will make them take you back and love you again."

She blanches, grabbing his hands, shaking her head.

"It doesn't matter to me, Jess! I don't care about them! It doesn't!"

He sighs.

"Rory, when you're at Yale, when you graduate, where do you want to go?"

She looks at him confusedly, her eyes damp.

"Jess, I've already told you. I want to be a foreign correspondent! I want to go to state dinners, and do specials for CNN, and……."

They both stand there in gentle, electric silence.

"Where do I fit in Rory? How do I afford to come out and see you? What will you tell everyone, all your high society friends that you make? What makes you so sure you won't change your mind when it gets too hard, when it becomes difficult?"

She drops his hand, stepping away from him.

"You're the only one that runs away," is all she says, and her voice is cool and detached. He feels the knife drive cleanly through.

She starts searching for her purse. It's dark in the apartment now, and she has forgotten to turn on a light. Tears of frustration are beginning to form as she throws aside pillows and looks behind furniture. He flicks a light-switch on, and sees her purse behind the counter. He hands it to her.

She grabs it, and slides on her coat. She turns her wet eyes to him, and sniffs hard, wiping at her nose.

"I'll be at that diner where we ate breakfast yesterday. I need to think of something to fix this. Come and find me later if you have anything else to add."

He nods, letting her go.

Alone in the apartment, he curses and throws the empty juice carton hard against the wall. 

One hour later, he wanders into the small restaurant. She is sitting in a far booth, her head bent over her coffee. The harsh electric lights flicker, and he can hear the hissing of the coffeepot. He sits across from her on the torn vinyl seat.

"I'm sorry," she says.

He shrugs.

"It's partly my fault. Maybe…..maybe I didn't think this was enough to make you love me later, when you had so much better things you could do. Maybe I thought that you'll never respect what I'm doing because it's dishonorable, always hate the thought of taking this money."

She shakes her head, tears cropping up again. He plays with a sugar packet, dumping it out in a small pile on the table, separating it into tiny lines with a knife.

"Maybe I thought you resented me because your feelings for me brought you down," he continues. "Maybe I thought that this wasn't good enough for you."

She shakes her head, tears dripping down her cheeks by now.

"And maybe, last of all, maybe you just wanted to be safe again, to not have to worry about me, be afraid for me."

Her hands slowly come towards him, cupping his face delicately. Firmly, her thumbs trace his cheekbones. 

"Everytime you say these things, everytime you push yourself too hard it makes me want to leave you more because I am ashamed I've forced you into this," she whispers. He wipes at her cheeks with the back of his hand, and then takes her hands from his face and folds them within his larger ones, protecting them there.

"I won't let you go. I won't stop either. I'm going to be worth something, so that I can truly deserve you, and no one else will be able to contradict me."

She shakes her head sadly.

"This isn't the way, Jess."

He sighs.

"I don't have enough time for any other way."

They sit in silence. She comes over to his side of the booth and curls up into his shoulder.

He pays her tab.

"Let's go."

They stumble blindly into the apartment, her mouth on his, pushing him backwards. She seems feverish, blindly determined, confused but insistent. He's never seen her so aggressive, so demanding, so much like him. She pulls off his coat, crushing his lips with her kisses. He puts his hands on her waist; she grabs at them, and places them on her breasts. Her cheeks are still damp. A breath catches in her throat, a small hiccup almost.

"I'm so tired from crying. My eyes have nothing left," she whispers forcefully, her hands ripping at his belt, fumbling with the buckles. He grabs them, trying to slow her down, but things are waking up in him, a strangely intense arousal. She is frenzied, and her mouth is everywhere and nowhere at the same time, making him shudder. Clothes are being strewn. Socks and shoes, shirt. She crawls out of her clothes seemingly all at once, flinging them into the darkness, pressing her warm body to his fiercely. She tries to remember everything he likes, touching all the right places, playing some kind of dark and distorted magic on him, pulling him in. She forces everything, relentless, like a small, furious child, grabbing his hand and putting it between her legs, pushing her breasts into his neck, his mouth, her hair in his eyes. Her hands slip under his waistband, waking him up from the spell with a sudden jolt. He tries to lay her down, to take her, but she won't let him, petulant and insistent. She pushes him down to the floor.

He is whispering her name. Praying. Rory, oh Rory, God. Yes Rory. Yes.

She is wrestling with her panties, trying to slide them off her legs, kicking them away, and then she's pinning him down, clenching, and he's groaning, gasping for air, hands on her things, pulling her down. A cry of something between pain and sadness escapes her throat, muffled by his mouth. Every single muscle in his body contracts.

He hears her whisper something so softly and sweetly that he cannot hear it. He watches her lips, and she says it again, louder.

Darling. Lover. Darling. Oh love.

He closes his eyes, and lets her swallow, envelop, drown him completely. 

The pale moonlight pools on her still face, her eyes still wide open. He could not sleep if he tried.

Her skin is salty and sweet under his lips. He places a chaste kiss on her temple, on her soft hair. 

"I love you," he tells her. "I wish I had another way to say those same words, a way no one had thought of before."

He thinks about a cigarette and then lets go of the thought. 

"While the lioness, loosed her slender dress, and naked they conveyed to caves the sleeping maid," he whispers to her, turning his head to look at her. He sees a small smile break out on her face that she tries to hide.

"William Blake," she whispers back. "Little Girl Lost."

She thinks for a second.

"Remember this summer when we were in Savannah and I was reading The Awakening by Chopin……."

He nods.

"I put a mark on this page where I found something that I wanted to say to you but I couldn't."

He pulls his torso up, propping it on one elbow.

She crawls over to a stack of books, finger sliding down the bindings until she pulls one out, the book almost falling open to a place well marked by many openings and closings.

She curls up next to him, but does not give him the book.

Instead, she begins speaking, looking at him, barely looking at the words on the page.

"I love you," she whispered, "only you, no one but you." 

She pauses, and his lips form her name. Rory.

"It was you who awoke me last summer out of a life-long, stupid dream. Oh! you have made me so unhappy with your indifference. Oh! I have suffered, suffered! Now you are here we shall love each other, my Robert," she finishes hoarsely, looking away.

She puts the book down carefully, almost sadly.

He doesn't know what to say.

They lay together in silence for a minute.

"I'm sorry for what happened that year."

She nods.

"I know."

He shifts, turning towards her.

"I loved you the entire time."

She nods tearfully, like a small child.

"I know."


End file.
